A Twisted Fairytale
by Brownbug
Summary: **Now Complete**  "Tick tock, goes the clock, time runs ever faster. Tick tock, goes the clock, especially for the Master!"... What if the Master died on Mnemosyne, leaving Tejana pregnant and alone?  Just how far would she go to see him again?  Master/OC
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: I don't own Doctor Who or anything related to it.**

**Summary: _"Tick tock, goes the clock, Now what would we rather? Tick tock, goes the clock, a child without a father". _What if, as the puppets foretold, the Master died on Mnemosyne, leaving Tejana pregnant and alone? Just how far would she be prepared to go to see him just one more time? Master/OC**

**Author's Note: This is another story set in my "One Moment in Time" Whoniverse, following on from the events in "The Master's Rose". It's strictly a "what-if" story, an AU of my own story-canon, if you like. It does NOT mean I have decided to kill the Master at the end of "The Master's Rose", because I haven't even written the end yet, so no throwing things at me, OK? There are no spoilers for "The Master's Rose" contained in this at all.**

**Big thanks to Theta'sWorstNightmare for reading this through before I posted :)  
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><p><strong>CHAPTER ONE<strong>

Tejana watched the time rotor oscillating up and down, back and forth, always with an odd little wobble as it rose, the only thing to break the almost hypnotic rhythm. The beautiful psychic harmonies of the Doctor's TARDIS, so familiar from her girlhood, drifted through her mind, warm and soothing and comforting. Helping her not to think. Because thinking was bad. So very bad. Thinking...remembering...existing at all...it just brought back the pain. The emptiness. The ripping, tearing, agonising feeling of loss, slicing through her like a knife.

"Tejana? Tejana! Are you all right?"

She could hear the voice, swimming through the anaesthetic numbness of the void she had created for herself, calling her back to reality. She had an idea that the person had been speaking to her for a while, but she hadn't wanted to listen. She still didn't want to listen, but whoever it was didn't seem to be giving up. Her eyes focused reluctantly on the speaker. A young man with messy brown hair, earnest blue eyes and a rather large nose.

_Rory Williams_. Amy Pond's husband.

Tejana liked Rory, she really did. He was a nice bloke, one of the nicest she had ever met. But his wasn't the voice she wanted to hear. And his face wasn't the one she so badly wanted to see.

"What?" she asked distantly.

"I asked if you were all right," he repeated. He was using that tone, the one they all used with her now. The gentle, careful tone, as if she was made of glass – as if, by speaking too quickly or too loudly, they might shatter her into a thousand fragile pieces. But it was a bit too late for that. Everything inside her had already shattered and there was nothing left. Nothing that could ever be repaired.

"I'm fine."

He held a plate out towards her. "You missed lunch. And breakfast. So I brought you a sandwich from the kitchen."

She shook her head. "Thanks. But I don't want it."

"You have to eat, Tejana." That was Amy, right behind Rory. If you found one, the other was never too far away. After all, that was how it should be, when you were a couple. Lovers. Soul-mates. Always together, never apart. Forever. "Think of the baby."

At Amy's words, Tejana's hand moved involuntarily to her stomach, stroking over the slight, almost imperceptible bump that swelled there. The baby. _His _baby. The son that he had wanted so very much, but now would never see. The sudden upsurge of choking pain was so great that it nearly drove her to her knees. But somehow, she managed to control it, forcing it back down, refusing to look at it. Because she knew that if she looked at it, if she accepted what it was - _why _it was - she would start screaming and she would never, ever stop.

She could feel the Doctor's eyes on her. He was watching her closely from across the other side of the console. They hadn't spoken much, since she'd been back on board his TARDIS. Just day-to-day inconsequential stuff. But that was the Doctor all over – he had never been particularly good at deep, emotional father-daughter stuff. She could sense that he wanted to talk to her, but he didn't know how. He had never known how. In the past, when she was younger, that had hurt her a lot. But not now. Now, she didn't want to talk anyway. What was the point? There was nothing he could say that would make it any better. It would never be any better. Not ever.

Rory was still holding the sandwich out to her, while Amy stood with her arms crossed stubbornly, her foot tapping insistently on the floor. The small tapping sound almost had a beat to it. _One...two...three...four. One...two...three...four. One...two...three...four._

Tejana drew in a small harsh breath that was almost a sob and snatched the sandwich from Rory's hand, cramming it in her mouth with trembling fingers. Anything, _anything_, if only they would go away and leave her alone. A shudder wracked her body and she felt Amy's arm slip around her shoulders, but it didn't help. Amy's weren't the arms she needed.

"So...where should we go next?" the Doctor was saying, with a cheerfulness that didn't quite touch the bleakness of his eyes. "Somewhere relaxing, somewhere restful. Somewhere where we can put our feet up. A planet with mountains maybe...or somewhere with beaches. Beaches are cool."

Tejana dimly heard Rory reply, but she didn't make any sense of his words. It didn't matter to her where they went. One place was just as good as another, since she couldn't be in the only place she wanted to be. Again, she felt the lulling song of the TARDIS brushing through her mind, as if the sentient time-machine felt her anguish and wanted to comfort her. Blinking back hot tears, Tejana allowed the feeling to wash over her, holding it close, like a child clinging to a well-loved blanket, wrapping it protectively around herself.

_If only I could see him, _she thought painfully, giving shape to the need that ached like a wound deep inside her. _Just once more. Just to say goodbye._

The TARDIS gave a gentle hum inside her head, almost as if in answer, and the temporal energy gleaming inside the time rotor seemed to shimmer and glisten.

"I know! The Garden Planet of Chumeria!" the Doctor announced. "Perfect choice. Just the ticket for a bit of rest and relaxation. Beautiful place! As long as we arrive before the Bannermen attack, of course – wasn't much left after that. Right then! Bit of tweaking on the navigational terminal..." His hands flew across the console as he spoke. "And then we should be good to go!"

With that he slammed down the de-materialisation lever and the entire control room shook violently, throwing all four time travellers off their feet. Sparks flew across the console and the time rotor quaked and groaned ominously.

"Doctor!" Amy called, clinging on to one of the railings with both hands as she struggled to stand upright. "What's happening?"

"Don't know!" he yelled back as he tried a different lever, only to see another shower of sparks flying through the air. "Controls aren't working!"

"Not again!" Rory groaned from his prone position on the floor, not even bothering to try and get up.

"Woo hoo!" the Doctor cried exuberantly, hanging on to the console for dear life as the TARDIS bucked madly through the Time Vortex. "I've got no idea where she's taking us, but it's definitely one wild ride! Geronimo!"

Tejana held on tightly to one of the jump seats, using it to anchor her in place. To her astonishment, despite the unexplained turbulence, the steady psychic ululation in the back of her head had not changed one bit. It was not worried or concerned or anxious – if anything, it seemed oddly determined. The Doctor might not know where they were going, but the TARDIS certainly did.

At last, there was one final, bone-shaking bump and the straining time rotor subsided into stillness.

"Well, we're here," the Doctor remarked into the sudden silence, apparently unperturbed by the unorthodox journey.

"And where exactly is 'here'?" Amy inquired tartly, giving Rory her hand and yanking him to his feet.

The Doctor was already bounding down the stairs, intent on checking the fizzing circuitry under the central console. "Still no idea," he called up to them. "All the systems appear to be off-line!"

Sure enough, all the screens on the control panels were covered in undecipherable waves of white, crackling static. Rory and Amy gave each other a resigned glance and followed the Doctor down to the lower level, peering in at him as he tinkered with several long cables he had detached from under the console.

Not really caring what was going on, Tejana sat down on the seat she had been clinging to, her legs folding wearily under her. Suddenly, she felt a sharp nudge inside her head, almost like an invisible hand urging her in the direction of the outer doors. Her hand flew to her forehead. _What the...? _But before she could react, the nudge came again, even more distinctly than before. A flash of light caught her eye as the screens in front of her flickered and then sprang to life. She was about to call the Doctor's attention to it, when she read the words scrolling across the navigational terminal.

**Location: London, Great Britain, Earth.**

**Date: 16 May 2008.**

Both her hearts seemed to turn over at once, her breath catching incredulously in her throat as she remembered the implications of that particular year for the Earth. She could hear her own thoughts, echoing back to her, almost like an actual voice, as if someone was trying to remind her of what she had so recently wished for:

_Just once more. Just to say goodbye._

Again, a gentle psychic shove, subtly pushing her towards the exit. All at once, she understood what the TARDIS had done. This was the only possible point within the causal nexus where she could encounter the Master's final incarnation without technically crossing her own timeline and causing a paradox – the four short days between the reception for Professor Lazarus and the elections that saw Harold Saxon become Prime Minister of Great Britain. Right now, there was no chance of her meeting her earlier self on Earth. That Tejana was far away in another galaxy with the Doctor and Martha, answering a distress call on board a distant spaceship known as the _S. S. Pentallion_, which was on a collision course with a fiery star. Nevertheless, the TARDIS was treading a very fine line, technically abiding by the letter of the Laws of Time, but only just. Crossing into established events was strictly forbidden. But sometimes there was a little leeway. Room for what the Doctor had always called "cheap tricks". Maybe this was one of those times.

Tejana got to her feet and tiptoed quietly down the stairs, behind Rory and Amy's backs. The Doctor was still babbling away in his usual disjointed fashion, speculating on what could have caused the disruption, his eyes fixed on his buzzing sonic screwdriver as he tried to override whatever was jamming the TARDIS systems. None of them noticed as Tejana grabbed her coat and moved silently across to the double doors leading to the outside world. The right hand door was already slightly ajar, as if it was ready and waiting for her to pass through it.

She knew that if the Doctor saw her leaving, he would try to stop her. There was no way she should be doing this. Even with the sanction of the TARDIS, it went against every rule the Time Lords had ever had. Messing with the causal nexus was a huge no-no, rife with the potential for disaster. But right at that moment, she didn't care. She wouldn't speak to the Master, wouldn't do anything to cause a paradox – she wouldn't even let him know she was there. All she wanted, the _only_ thing she wanted, was to see his face again. Surely that wasn't too much to ask. Surely it couldn't hurt, just one more time. Surely, surely, after all that had happened, the Universe owed her at least that much.

As she slipped out through the open door, she smoothed her hand gratefully down the wooden exterior of the TARDIS, knowing that the time machine had done this out of love and concern for her.

_Thank you, old girl._

And as she hurried out into the cold, busy London street, the door shut behind her and there was a small click as the deadlock snapped into place. Up on the glass platform, all the screens on the console shivered into static once more, hiding their tell-tale data from view.

Satisfied with what she had done, the TARDIS gave a small hum of pleasure and settled back into her usual inertia, waiting to see what the Doctor would do.


	2. Chapter 2

**Author's Note: Hello again! Big thanks to everyone who was kind enough to review the first chapter yesterday, you all made me very happy - MayFairy, mericat, Imorgen, PhoenixWormwood137 and SawManiac211.**

**To SawManiac211: The system is being silly again at the moment and won't let me reply to your review - So thanks very much for your comment and all I can say to you is "Mwa ha ha ha ha!" - LOL!**

**Thanks again to Theta'sWorstNightmare for looking over this before I posted it.  
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><p><strong>CHAPTER TWO<strong>

The Master looked into the mirror and smiled in satisfaction at the man staring back at him.

_Harold Saxon. _The ultimate lie.

The man in the mirror had neatly cut brown hair; strong, handsome, youthful features; and a pair of intense, compelling whiskey-coloured eyes. He was dressed in a beautifully cut dark suit from one of the best London tailors. Harold Saxon was a patriot through and through – no Italian-made couture for _him_. His white shirt was immaculate, worn with a plain black tie, the overall effect sober but extremely stylish. _Damn, but this incarnation looked good in a suit!_

Harold Saxon. Cambridge graduate. Rugby Blue. Successful businessman. Published author. Happily married man. Up and coming young politician. Former Minister of Defence. Self-proclaimed Renaissance Man of the 21st century. Soon to be Prime Minister of Great Britain.

And all of it, all of it, a complete and utter fabrication, which the people of planet Earth had eagerly swallowed, hook, line and sinker. He nearly laughed out loud at the sheer beauty of it. The stupid, stinking apes had no idea what was in store for them.

It was the perfect disguise. Almost as perfect as Professor Yana had been. The main difference was, this time around, he was entirely aware of who was hiding inside himself, behind the thin, plastic veneer of Harold Saxon, just waiting for the right time to emerge.

He was _the Master._ In a few short days, he would be ruler of this loathsome little planet. And, after that, ruler of the entire Universe, as was only fitting for one of the last Lords of Time. His plan was foolproof and no-one could stop him. It was all his for the taking.

As always, his mind drifted to the Doctor and his daughter, stranded at the end of the Universe on the planet Malcassairo, trying to fend off a horde of invading Futurekind with Captain Freak and the human girl, Martha Jones. Any one else would just do the expected thing and die, there and then. But the Master knew the Doctor far too well to believe that. The other Time Lord had an almost supernatural ability to escape the most life-threatening of situations. And Tejana wasn't exactly a slouch when it came to getting out of a tight corner either. No, they were still alive, both of them – he could feel it like an icy breeze on his skin. They were alive and they would come for him, sooner or later. It was not a question of 'if', but a question of 'when'.

His hands moved to straighten his tie. He could feel the weight of the laser screwdriver, concealed in the inner pocket of his jacket, and his lips curved in a smile of cold amusement. Let them come. He was more than ready for them. The Lazarus technology was the ultimate in a series of carefully laid traps, just waiting for him to spring on his unsuspecting enemies. Because, until he triumphed over the Doctor, his victory could not be complete. Then, and only then, after centuries of battling his arch-enemy, would the Master finally have won.

"Harry, the car has arrived," a soft voice said from behind him, interrupting his thoughts. "We need to hurry, or we'll be late."

Turning, he saw his human wife, Lucy Saxon, slender and lovely in her cream Chanel designer suit. Another part of his perfect disguise. Gorgeous. Blonde. Upper class. Well connected. Adoring. And absolutely brainless.

He had chosen her so carefully, the ideal companion to have on Harold Saxon's arm, endlessly loyal and pathetically eager to please. But sometimes – like now, for instance - the sight of that vapid, doll-like face just made him want to backhand her across the room, irritating him beyond bearing. She was so _boring_. Boring, boring, _boring_! Boring to look at, boring to talk to, boring in bed. Every time she opened her mouth, her utter stupidity grated on him more and more.

"I'm sure they'll wait for us, sweetheart," he replied mildly, comforting himself with the thought that he only had to keep up the charade for a few more days. "But you're right, we'd better get going."

They were heading for a charity banquet for homeless people, just the sort of philanthropic cause that Harold Saxon was supposed to be vitally interested in.

_Homeless people! _the Master sneered contemptuously to himself. The humans really didn't need to worry about that sort of thing any more. Once he came to power, there would be no more need for charity banquets, because there would_ be _no more homeless people. Under his rule, there would only be two types of human...those who could work and those who were dead.

"Oh, Harry," Lucy twittered, reaching out to him and fiddling nervously with his tie. "I'm so proud of you."

Resisting the urge to slap her hand away, he forced himself to smile at her. "Thank you, darling. I'm proud of you too. Shall we, then?"

She put her arm in his and, with one last glance at his reflection in the mirror, he led her courteously out of the door.

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><p>"Aha!" the Doctor exclaimed triumphantly, joining two wires together with the sonic screwdriver, ducking aside as a shower of sparks cascaded down on his head. "That should do it."<p>

"Do what, exactly?" Amy inquired.

"Manual override," he said, jumping down from the maintenance sling he had been sitting in, suspended under the console platform. "Rory, check the navigational computer. Let's find out where we are."

Rory turned and climbed back up the stairs to the console. Sure enough, everything looked normal again, the control panels twinkling with lights and the screens free of any interference. He circled around until he could read the data on the required terminal. "London, May 2008."

Down below, the Doctor stopped stock still, as if Rory had just slapped him. "2008? Did you say 2008?"

"Yeah," Rory confirmed. But then, seeing the shocked look on the Doctor's face, he asked suspiciously, "Why? What's wrong with 2008?"

"It's a weak spot in the causal nexus," the Time Lord frowned. "Time has already been re-written here at least twice – the "Year That Never Was", then the "Year That Never Was, That Never Was"...oh blimey, this isn't good, this isn't good at all. We shouldn't be here, we have to..."

He broke off abruptly, his eyes scanning the console room, his brain clicking into gear as he suddenly realised that something important was missing and had been for a while. "Where's Tejana?"

Concerned at the uncharacteristic alarm in his voice, both Amy and Rory looked around them in surprise. "She was here a few minutes ago," Amy replied with a small shrug. "Maybe she went up to her room."

But the Doctor slowly rotated on his heel until he was facing the door, a cold sensation trickling down the back of his neck. "No," he muttered. "Oh, no, no, no...she wouldn't, would she?"

"Wouldn't _what_?" Rory queried, getting impatient with the Time Lord's cryptic behaviour.

The Doctor didn't reply. Instead, he rushed over to the TARDIS doors and tried to open them. They stuck fast, refusing to move.

"Dead-locked!" he muttered, tugging uselessly at the interior locking mechanism, which also would not budge. In desperation, he applied the sonic screwdriver to the lock, but to no avail. He was frustrated, but not surprised - the screwdriver had never been able to breach a dead-lock.

Whirling around, he glared up at the TARDIS console. "You're doing this, aren't you?" he yelled angrily. "You're not helping her by coming here, you know!"

Rory shot Amy a bewildered glance. "Erm, oooo-kay...is he shouting at the _TARDIS_ now?" he whispered.

"Doctor, what's going on?" Amy demanded.

"The TARDIS has taken it upon herself to play fairy godmother and has very kindly sent Tejana to the ball!" the Doctor growled sarcastically, his voice still raised, to make sure the time machine could hear every word, loud and clear. "Only, when the clock strikes midnight and everything turns back into a pumpkin, who do you think will have to pick up the pieces? Me, that's who!"

Amy sighed with exasperation. "What are you talking about?"

"16 May 2008. Four days before the British elections. Right now, here in London, Harold Saxon is preparing to give one of the last speeches of his campaign, at a charity banquet at the Claridges Hotel."

Amy's eyes widened in horror as she suddenly understood what he was getting at. "Harold Saxon? You mean she's gone to see...?"

"The Master," he finished grimly.

Rory raised his hand like a kid in school. "OK, I'm still not following. Harold Saxon was the Prime Minister that went mad, wasn't he? The one that murdered the U.S. President in cold blood and then shot himself. What's he got to do with Tejana?"

"Harold Saxon wasn't human, Rory," Amy told him. "He was really the Master. He enslaved the Earth and then tried to conquer the Universe. The Doctor stopped him and reversed it all, so none of it ever happened. That's why it's called 'The Year That Never Was'."

"The Master?" Rory repeated incredulously. "As in, Tejana's dead boyfriend, the Master? He did all that?"

"It's...complicated," the Doctor said. "They weren't together back then. The point being, if she finds him in this time-line, before any of that happens, if he so much as sees her, let alone if she speaks to him or touches him, she could potentially cause a paradox that would change the whole course of human history."

"Yeah, but this is Tejana we're talking about. She's your daughter, so she must know all this stuff about potential paradoxes," Rory responded. "She's not going to do anything too stupid, is she?"

"Rory's right," Amy chimed in. "Maybe she just needs to see the Master from a distance one last time as some sort of closure, so she can get past his death and move on with her life. The TARDIS obviously trusts her not to stuff it up, maybe we should too."

The Doctor closed his eyes and rubbed at his temples, reminding himself that they were human, not Time Lords, and couldn't possibly fathom how serious this situation could get. He remembered Jack telling him how he had watched a young Rose growing up on her housing estate from a distance, after he thought she had been killed at Canary Wharf, without ever speaking to her, in case he caused a paradox. Somehow it had helped him grieve for her loss. But Tejana was not Jack, and the Master was not Rose. This was one of the most dangerous and unstable points in the history of the Earth, and Tejana and the Master were two of the most significant players in the way it had all turned out. The potential for catastrophe was immense. The Doctor could easily empathise with Tejana's driving need to recapture something of what she had lost - he had lost too many people himself not to get that. But what worried him was that he no longer knew how far she would be prepared to go to do it.

"Yes, she's my daughter," he agreed. "But she was also, to all intents and purposes, the Master's wife. And she's grieving. I've never seen her quite like this before – it's as if she thinks she's got nothing left to lose. All of which makes her a loose cannon and very dangerous. I'm not sure what's she's capable of any more."

Glancing back up to the TARDIS console, he spoke to his ship again, his tone no longer angry, but sad and weary instead. "I know you care about her. Really, I do. But you're not doing her any favours. Whatever he became, whatever they ended up being to each other, the Master from this timeline can never be good for her. You should know that better than anyone. Or have you forgotten about the Paradox Machine?"

For a few seconds, there was a heavy, loaded silence in the room, as if the TARDIS was considering his words. Then there was a quiet, almost sheepish click, as the dead-lock disengaged.

"_Thank _you," the Doctor said fervently, swinging the door wide. "Now, come along, Ponds. We have to stop her, before something goes wrong."

Hurriedly, Amy and Rory pulled on their jackets and accompanied him outside. The TARDIS had apparently landed in the mouth of an alleyway, leading on to a crowded London shopping strip. The time machine's perception filter was obviously in fine working order, since scores of people rushed up and down the street, passing the tall, blue box without even a cursory glance. Or maybe it was just that Londoners were too used to strange things, so it was very hard to attract their attention. The air was very chilly, but overhead the sky was a clear, pure, cloudless blue.

Amy shivered and drew her coat more closely around her. "If Tejana is Cinderella, the Master is the handsome prince and the TARDIS is the fairy godmother, does that make the Doctor the evil stepmother and us the ugly stepsisters?" she joked to Rory.

But Rory didn't smile back as he took her hand and they followed the Doctor up the street. "Yeah, and look how well it turned out for them," he muttered grimly.


	3. Chapter 3

**_Author's Note: Thanks very much to MayFairy and Imorgen for reviewing the previous chapter. It means a lot to know that at least two people are enjoying this. Here's the next bit!_  
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><p><strong>CHAPTER THREE<strong>

Tejana stood at the back of the crowd outside the iconic Claridges Hotel, unable to believe the number of people milling around. It was almost as if a famous pop star was expected to appear at any moment. People were craning to see the door, many of them holding autograph books or waving placards with the "Vote Saxon!" slogan. Somewhere in the middle of the crowd, someone started to shout, "Vote Saxon! Vote Saxon! Vote Saxon!" The chant was taken up by hundreds of others, until the noise was almost deafening. And everywhere in the crowd, people were unconsciously tapping out a four-beat rhythm, not even realising they were doing it.

_One...two...three...four... One...two...three...four... One...two...three...four... _

Tejana stared around in astonishment. She had never understood before just how greatly the subtle influence of the Archangel Network had affected the British population in 2008. The atmosphere outside the hotel was almost electric, reminding her of the time she went to a Beatles concert in the 1960s with the Doctor, where they had seen teenage girls screaming and fainting everywhere from sheer hysteria. Some of these people were just as rabid in their evident adoration of Harold Saxon, with a cordon of uniformed police and black-dressed security guards having to work overtime to keep the excited, surging mob back from storming the hotel entrance.

Silently, she cursed the loss of her personal perception filter with the rest of her possessions back on Mnemosyne. Without that, she was going to find it very difficult to slip past the vigilant guards into the hotel in the middle of all this pandemonium. But then she remembered another ace she had up her sleeve or, more accurately, in her pocket. Perhaps she didn't have to sneak in. Perhaps she could just walk right in the front door.

Putting her hand into the back pocket of her jeans, she drew out her old Torchwood ID. She hadn't taken it with her when she ran off to travel with the Master. It had been left on her desk at the Hub, from where, for some reason, the Doctor had retrieved it and returned it to her. Tejana suspected that her father was hoping she might eventually try to pick up the threads of her old life, perhaps even building a new future, for her and her child, with Jack. Deep in her hearts, she knew that was never going to happen. But perhaps the ID might come in handy after all.

She glanced down at the small laminated card in her hand. It was not a photo ID, thank goodness, considering her regeneration had changed her appearance so drastically. But here in 2008, the security clearance codes listed on the card should be sufficient to grant her access anywhere. Moreover, Tejana had always suspected that the Torchwood IDs were printed on slightly psychic paper, since no-one had ever challenged any member of the team once they were produced. She had asked Jack about it once, but he had just given her his trademark grin and had told her that she didn't want to know.

From what she could tell, the black-dressed security men were actually in charge of maintaining order outside the hotel, with the police called in as extra back-up. That didn't surprise Tejana. Before the elections, people had assumed that these men were merely Harold Saxon's personal bodyguard. But no-one had ever realised just how many of them there were. It was only after the Master had taken over the world with the Toclafane that it became apparent that he had been building his own personal human army all along. After that, the black-dressed soldiers had become known as the United Containment Forces, or the UCF. Backed up by the lethal Toclafane, they had been the ones to enforce the Master's martial law on the Earth, organising the work camps and ruthlessly destroying any attempt at rebellion.

Taking a deep breath, fighting her inherent claustrophobia, Tejana began ducking and weaving through the swelling mob of people, using her small size as an advantage to push through to the front. She hated crowds. It wasn't that long ago that she had nearly been crushed to death in a stampeding crowd on Mnemosyne and she had no wish to repeat the experience. Especially since this time, if the mob turned nasty, there was no John Hart to save her.

At last, she managed to reach one of the security guards standing at the edge of the cordon. He was a big, blonde man, wearing Sergeant's stripes on his arm.

"Excuse me," she said. Then, as he ignored her, she repeated more loudly, "EXCUSE ME!"

A pair of pale blue eyes swivelled towards her and looked her up and down, taking in her small stature and her delicate features, framed by an unruly mass of dark-copper hair. His mouth widened in an amused, condescending smile.

"I hope you're not going to ask me to get you in to see Mister Saxon, miss, because I'd hate to have to say no to a pretty little thing like you."

Tejana's gaze was cold and haughty as she handed him her ID card. "My name is Anna Smith, Sergeant. I may be a 'pretty little thing', as you so charmingly put it, but I am also a Torchwood operative and I have been assigned to attend this event as an undercover observer. So I would appreciate it if you would let me through, please."

The Sergeant stared down at the ID in his hand, a look of astonishment and growing interest spreading across his weathered face. "Torchwood!" he exclaimed, awestruck.

He was obviously familiar with the name. Torchwood had always been the most non-secret "secret organisation" Tejana had ever come across. When she had worked with them in Cardiff, they had driven around in a huge, black SUV with "Torchwood" emblazoned on the side, for Gallifrey's sake – it had hardly been subtle. And Owen had regularly ordered pizza to be delivered directly to the Hub under the name of Torchwood. Jack had always been too arrogant to care much about secrecy. All the extra attention had seemed to amuse him, as if it gave their team some sort of celebrity status. From the expression on this soldier's face, it appeared that Torchwood London had been no more discreet in their day.

"You don't think there are _aliens _in there, do you?" he asked in a breathless undertone, his eyes bright and eager at the prospect, clearly hoping for some excitement to brighten his mundane day.

A small, ironic smile touched her lips. He had _no_ idea. In four days, he and the rest of the human race were going to be neck deep in aliens, with more excitement than any of them had ever imagined or wanted. "You can never be too careful, Sergeant. Now, if you wouldn't mind, I need to do my job."

"Of course, Ms. Smith," he said, snapping smartly to attention. "This way."

And without any further discussion, he ushered her courteously through the security cordon into the hotel and through to the ballroom, where the charity banquet was being held. The huge, Art Deco-styled room was lavishly decorated in silver and black and was filled with large round tables, laden with enormous flower arrangements. Natural light flooded in through the five massive floor-to-ceiling windows, glittering off what seemed like acres of shining glassware and cutlery. Scores of elegantly dressed people were seated at the tables, all their heads turned with rapt attention to the long table on a dais at the far end of the room, where the special guests and VIPs sat.

"They've just finished dessert," the Sergeant said, bending down to whisper in Tejana's ear as they stood unobtrusively with the other security personnel and the serving staff at the back of the room. "You're just in time to hear Mr Saxon give his speech."

As Tejana watched, a fat man with a large black moustache moved to stand behind a polished wooden lectern, clearing his throat self-consciously before bending his head towards the microphone in front of him.

"And now, ladies and gentlemen, without any further ado," he announced in a deep, ponderous voice. "I give you our guest of honour...Harold Saxon."

The room rocked with thunderous applause. After that, Tejana was no longer aware of the Sergeant, or the fat man, or anyone else in the room. The only person who existed for her was the handsome man in the dark suit who took his place behind the lectern, looking out over the audience with that beautiful, white, familiar smile that never once reached his eyes.

And outside the big ballroom windows, a dark shadow seemed to slip across the brightness of the sun.

* * *

><p>"Come on, we have to hurry," the Doctor urged, striding along the footpath as fast as he could, dodging the startled shoppers who got in his way. "I'm guessing she's got at least a half an hour's start on us."<p>

"Can't you...you know...talk to her in your head?" Rory asked, hand-in-hand with Amy, both of them breathless from trying to keep up with the Time-Lord's long-legged pace. "That psychic link thingie?"

"I could," the Doctor replied over his shoulder. "Except that she's shielding for all she's worth and I can't get through. She knows she shouldn't be doing this and she doesn't want me trying to stop her."

Glancing up at the sky, Amy turned her coat collar up around her ears as she hurried along. Dark clouds were swirling directly above them in the previously clear sky.

"Looks like there's going to be a storm," she said. "A bad one."

The Doctor increased his pace still further, without even bothering to look up. "That's not a storm," he replied curtly.

"What is it then?" Rory inquired, eyeing the churning black clouds with apprehension.

"She's found him. Things are already starting to go wrong."

"And if they go properly wrong? What happens then?"

The Doctor gave him a piercing glance. "Let's just hope we never have to find out, Rory."


	4. Chapter 4

**_Author's Note: Thanks to MayFairy, Theta'sWorstNightmare, SawManiac211 and Imorgen for reviewing the previous chapter, I appreciate it very much. Here's today's installment:_  
><strong>

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><p><strong>CHAPTER FOUR<strong>

Harold Saxon looked out over his attentive audience, a pleasant, enthusiastic expression on his face as he spoke the bland, meaningless words his campaign speech-writer had so laboriously written for him. Inwardly, concealed behind his carefully cultivated mask, the Master sneered at the blatant hypocrisy of the people in the room.

_Look at them_, he thought disdainfully. _All the parasites, all the disgusting, stupid, over-fed, waste-of-space apes__!_

Each one of these people had spent exorbitant amounts of money to be here, the women dressed in designer fashions and dripping with precious jewels, the men sipping at their glasses of expensive brandy. All of them pretending to care about providing for the homeless, when really what they cared about was being seen at one of the most exclusive political events of the year. They were all so very eager to jump on the Saxon bandwagon, reaching out with greedy hands to snatch some of his reflected glory. Even as he talked about leading Britain into a new golden age of prosperity, he entertained himself by imagining what these vain, pathetic humans would look like in a few short days, grovelling at his feet where they belonged, dressed in rags, slaving day and night to build his fleet of warships.

They watched him with wide, entranced eyes, mesmerised by every word he said. It didn't matter that most of it didn't even make sense. It didn't matter that he had no policies, no real solutions to offer to their problems. The Archangel Network took care of that. He could have been reciting a shopping list for all they cared. Outside, he could faintly hear the mob screaming his name in the street, desperate for just a glimpse of him.

His smile widened. He was close now, so very close. Soon everything he had ever wanted would be within his grasp. And who would ever have thought that the Doctor's beloved humans would be the perfect tool for achieving the Master's ultimate victory? The irony of it was just too perfect.

Then, without warning, he felt it, and his body tensed in instant reaction. Someone here was shielding their mind. It was subtle and quiet and very, very expert. Ordinarily, he might not have noticed it at all. However, in the sea of wide-open human consciousness created by the Archangel Network it was different enough to stand out like a beacon. He had come across some strong-minded humans who were resistant to the hypnotic rhythm silently infiltrating their planet, but nothing to this degree. No, there were only two possible people, apart from himself, who would be here on Earth and shielding like that. But which one was it? Without missing a beat in the delivery of his speech, he pressed gently against the shielding with his mind, careful not to do anything to alert his target, while still mentally tasting the flavour of the other Time Lord. _Ahhh...a distinct impression of honeysuckle._ He drew in a deep, luxuriant breath, almost as if he could physically smell the wild, sweet, unique scent.

It was Tejana, without a doubt, no-one else felt quite like that. She was here somewhere, in this room. He thought of her as he had seen her just the night before, at the Lazarus reception. Dressed in her midnight blue gown, her hair piled high on her head, with just a few loose curls drifting deliciously down to caress her bare, white shoulders. He had never seen her dressed quite like that before, and he had to admit, he had been both surprised and fascinated. She had been beautiful enough that he had hardly been able to take his eyes off her, despite his own agenda for the evening. Hidden in the shadows, careful not to reveal his presence, he had watched her meet up with the Doctor at the reception as if she hadn't seen her father for quite some time and had not been expecting to bump into him. That had also surprised the Master. He hadn't realised they had been living separately before they ended up on Malcaissaro. He couldn't help wondering what had caused that. Some sort of breach? Some sort of argument? Something he might be able to use to drive a wedge between them? It was an interesting thought. Martha Jones had been with the Doctor, but there was no sign of Captain Freak. Apparently they had yet to pick him up somewhere before the four of them came to meet Professor Yana at the end of the Universe.

Still smiling and talking, giving no outward sign of his preoccupation, he slowly and deliberately scanned the room, searching for the slender figure with the long, dark hair. Where was she? And how had he missed her? At first glance, he could see no sign of her in the ballroom. She definitely wasn't sitting at any of the tables. But he knew he wasn't mistaken. She was there somewhere, he just had to find her. Narrowing his focus, he used his mind to search instead of his eyes, trying to identify the source of the shielding.

At last, his attention was caught and held by a small, fragile figure standing inconspicuously amongst the staff at the back of the room, all his senses locking on to her like a heat-seeking missile. This girl looked nothing like the dark-haired Tejana he had seen the night before or even back on Malcaissaro. She was not much more than five feet tall, with long, loose, copper-coloured hair flowing down her back, wearing jeans and a brown leather jacket. But he knew it was her, all the same. Somewhere along the line, she had regenerated. He shifted his gaze casually away from her, as if he hadn't noticed her, his mind racing as he tried to make sense of it all. Why had she changed? Had she been injured by the Futurekind after all? And why was she here on her own – where was the Doctor? Had something happened to him? Or was this all part of some sort of elaborate trap? Somehow, he had to find out. His plan could very well depend upon it.

Maintaining his polished facade as the consummate politician, he brought his speech to a close. All over the room, people leapt to their feet to give him a standing ovation. Graciously, he inclined his head, acknowledging the storm of applause with a charming smile as he sat back down in his seat, one hand reaching out to fondly hold Lucy's, just like the loving couple they were supposed to be. But he never once lost sight of the small, copper-haired figure at the back of the room, observing her intently like a snake about to strike, alert and ready to act depending on what she chose to do next. Sure enough, he saw her beginning to quietly back away, using the noise and confusion to cover her attempted retreat from the room.

_Oh no, you don't, little girl! _he thought coldly. With a sharp gesture of his hand, he summoned to his side a nearby blonde woman dressed in a tailored, black suit. This was Miss Elinore Dexter, his Head of Security. Despite her attractive appearance, she was one of the most ruthless and emotionless human beings he had ever met, both characteristics which suited his needs perfectly. Ignoring Lucy's querying glance, he whispered a few curt and concise instructions in Dexter's ear.

"Yes, Sir," the woman replied before hurrying off to do his bidding.

With a contented smile at Lucy, he leaned back in his chair and waited, looking out over the applauding crowd and accepting all the human adulation as his rightful due.

It seemed this was going to be an interesting day after all.

* * *

><p>Tejana could not have repeated one single word of Harold Saxon's speech. The words flowed over her, around her and past her, like a river, unnoticed and unremarked, as she drank in the sound of his voice. All she could think of was that same voice telling her how much he wanted her, how much he loved her, how he would never, ever let her go. <em>My beautiful Ana...my haven, my home. <em>She watched him standing there, so handsome and attractive in his beautifully-cut suit and helplessly remembered how his body had felt on hers, hard and hot and hungry, his mouth searching and demanding, so powerful and possessive, determined to own her in every way. _Her Master. _Anguish arced through her. He looked so vital, so alive, so _real_. Her hand went to her belly, cradling his child as it nestled deep inside her. She had told herself it would help, seeing him again, just one more time. Somehow she had really believed it would bring her some peace. But she knew now that she had lied to herself. She didn't just want to see him. She wanted to kiss him, to touch him, to hold him and never let him go. She wanted her child to know his father. She wanted to change everything that had happened, bring him back to her, make it _right_.

For the first time since his death on Mnemosyne, her numbing pain began to give way to something else. _Rage_, licking along her veins like tiny, scorching flames. Hot, blinding fury at the Universe for taking him away from her yet again. How many times and in how many ways did she have to lose him? She had always played by the rules, always tried to do the right thing, just as her father had taught her. And where had it got her? Here, in this place, drowning in sorrow as she looked at the man she loved but could no longer have. Had the Master been right all along? Did the nice guys always,_ always_ finish last?

_Oh gods, Koschei, why? WHY?_

Struggling for self-control, she forced back the grief-stricken scream that was building in her throat, her fists clenched tightly by her sides. For one tiny moment, as if he had heard her silent cry, his eyes seemed to seek hers across the crowded room. Both her hearts stood still, her muscles tense, the temptation to run to him almost irrefusable. But then his gaze moved on without stopping and she drew in a deep, ragged, hurtful breath. She had to get out of here. She just couldn't trust herself to stay - the anger, the need, the pain and the longing were far too great.

His speech had finished now. The audience was rising to its feet, applauding wildly, and he was smiling, so confident, so sure. She took one last look at him, her eyes filmed with tears as she tried to remember everything about him, engraving this final sight of him on to her hearts where it could never fade, never be lost, never die...

_Goodbye, Koschei. I love you._

Then she turned away, determined to make her way back to the TARDIS as quickly as she could, before her resolve broke and she forgot her responsibilities as a Time Lord and did something really, really stupid.

But before she could reach the ballroom door, she suddenly found her way blocked by two of the black-clad guards.

"I'm afraid you'll have to accompany us, Miss," one of them said briefly. "Mr Saxon would like a word."

Eyes widening in startled alarm and disbelief, Tejana whirled instinctively and glanced back towards the dais. This time there was no doubt that he was looking straight at her and that he was fully aware of exactly who she was. Still smiling, he gave her a deliberate and provocative wink, before turning back to shake hands genially with the fat man who had introduced him earlier.

"Oh, crap," she whispered, feeling the guard's hand closing on her upper arm like an inescapable vice as he began to lead her away.


	5. Chapter 5

******_Author's Note: Thanks very much to the people who reviewed the last chapter - SawManiac211, mericat, Imorgen, xxTeam-Masterxx, Theta'sWorstNightmare, MayFairy and MountainLord-92. Sorry for small delay in posting this one - busy weekend!  
><em>**

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><p><strong>CHAPTER FIVE<strong>

Tejana was not given any chance to escape. With one guard on each side of her, she was frog-marched out through one of the many service entrances at the rear of the hotel and forced to climb into the back of a van with darkly tinted windows. Her first instinct was to scream and kick and fight, to make sure she drew as much attention as she could to the fact that she was effectively being kidnapped. But then she changed her mind. She knew enough of the hold Harold Saxon had over the thoughts of the British public in 2008 not to bother. As long as the Archangel Network was in place, anything that was done on his orders would not be questioned.

Waiting for her in the back of the van was a blonde woman with cold, arrogant features. Tejana recognised her as the Master's chief enforcer - she remembered seeing her once before, when the Jones family had been taken into custody at the very beginning of The Year That Never Was. Dexter, that's what Francine had called her. Miss Dexter.

"Where are you taking me?" she demanded as the van doors slammed shut behind her, trapping her inside with the woman. Almost immediately, the engine started and the van swung sharply away from the curb.

"We told you. Mr Saxon wishes to speak to you," Dexter responded flatly.

"Yeah? Well, maybe I don't want to speak to _him_!" Tejana snapped.

"You don't have a choice, I'm afraid. Mr Saxon has given the order. And whatever Mr Saxon wants, Mr Saxon gets."

Tejana choked back a peal of bitter laughter at this. _Oh lady,_ she thought, _if you only knew! _

"You can't just arrest me. I haven't done anything wrong."

The woman gave her a cruel, thin-lipped smile. "Oh, I think you'll find that we can."

Her eyes wandered up and down Tejana's body and the Time Lady only just managed to suppress a shudder. She could tell this woman wanted to hurt her. It wasn't personal in any way, Miss Dexter just liked inflicting pain on people. But from the avid look in her cool grey eyes, it seemed that small, fragile-looking females particularly appealed to her. Tejana was eternally grateful that she couldn't see whatever sick fantasies were filling Dexter's head right then – she really didn't want to know. Once upon a time, the other woman's menacing presence would have alarmed her. But not any more. If she had to kill Dexter to protect her unborn child, then she would. It was that simple.

Ignoring the other woman completely, she stared out the tinted windows of the van, trying to think of a way out of this mess. She knew she should open up the psychic link and call to the Doctor for help. But she didn't want to do that, even though she was sure her father must have noticed she was missing by now. She knew he would be furious with her for the huge risk she had taken in coming to see Harold Saxon. He had never understood or approved of her relationship with the Master in the first place. Just the thought of trying to explain to him the terrible need that had driven her here made her feel like she was swallowing razor blades, the impossibility of putting her grief into words lacerating her deep inside. Besides, she told herself, bringing the Doctor into the Master's timeline this early would only compound the imminent paradox. Things were bad enough already. Somehow she would have to find a way to escape by herself, before she came face to face with the Master.

Resolutely, she ignored the insistent whisper in the back of her mind that told her the real reason she didn't want to involve the Doctor was that she didn't want to escape this at all – and that coming face to face with the Master was the one thing she wanted more than anything else in the Universe.

* * *

><p>"Wow!" was all Rory could say, looking across the street at the seething, chanting crowd outside the Claridges Hotel. "All this for a politician? You've got to be joking!"<p>

"Harold Saxon wasn't just any politician," the Doctor said grimly. "The Master was a Time Lord and absolutely brilliant into the bargain. With the help of the Archangel Network, he was almost unstoppable."

"Almost, but not quite, though, right?" Rory responded. "You managed to stop him, after all."

The Doctor gave him a dark look, shadowed by memory. "Only just. The 'Year That Never Was' was a long and bitter struggle for everyone concerned. That's why this is such a vulnerable point in the Earth's history. And to make matters worse, the Master hasn't even got his Paradox Machine up and running yet, so if Tejana causes a paradox now, there's nothing protecting the causal nexus."

"What's a Paradox Machine?" Amy asked. "You mentioned it earlier as well, when you were talking to the TARDIS."

The Doctor sighed and rubbed distractedly at his temples. "Back then, the Master stole the TARDIS from me and cannibalised her systems to create a stabilising device which enabled paradoxes to be sustained within the space/time continuum, something which is usually impossible."

"So, for instance, we could have gone back to Leadworth and met our younger selves, without it being dangerous?" Amy guessed. "Actually, that might be quite handy – there's a few things I wouldn't mind telling myself to do differently, if I ever got the chance!"

Unexpected anger sparkled in the Doctor's eyes. "Humans!" he exclaimed disgustedly. "It's never enough for you to just _see_ the Universe, you always have to want something back. I lost my planet, my entire race. Don't you think there are things _I'd _like to change if I could? But some things just aren't meant to happen, even for Time Lords. As it happens, the Master used his Paradox Machine to allow him to bring the last descendants of the human race back in time to slaughter their ancestors without temporal consequences."

Rory stared at him in horror. "You mean...?"

"Yes, at the beginning of the Year that Never Was, he decimated the Earth's population. Millions and millions of people were killed."

"Oooo-kay. And we're sorry this guy's dead because...?"

"Because Tejana loved him!" Amy retorted, glaring at both the two men, as if the answer to Rory's question should be more than obvious. "And he really loved her. People can change, you know, love does that. Anyway, that's all ancient history. The real question is, how are we going to find her in all this mess, Doctor?"

Before the Doctor could reply, the hotel doors swung open and a man and a woman emerged on to the red carpet, surrounded by a coterie of bodyguards. The crowd went absolutely wild, screaming and howling, "Harry! Harry!", while the air exploded with flashbulbs as the paparazzi took photograph after photograph of the happy couple posed in the doorway. Then both Harry and Lucy Saxon were smiling and waving to the crowd as they were escorted to the two black limousines that waited at the curb. Attentively, Harry handed Lucy into the back seat of the first limo, leaned in and gave her a farewell kiss, before closing the door and watching it drive away. Then he moved to the second car and the uniformed chauffeur bowed politely before opening the rear door for him to enter. For just one tiny second, Harold Saxon seemed to hesitate, gazing out over the excited mob as if he was looking for someone. The Doctor held his breath, his body tight with tension as the searching brown eyes passed over the section of the crowd where the three time travellers were concealed. But then the other man gave a small shrug and got into the limo. The chauffeur closed the door behind him and returned to the driver's seat, while the black-dressed security guards fought to hold the obsessed fans back from the car. The powerful engine purred and, slowly but surely, the car disappeared up the street.

"He's gone, thank God," Amy said, her shoulders sagging in relief. "The whole thing's over and the world didn't end or anything like that. We were all worried about nothing. Tejana's probably safely on her way back to the TARDIS right now, no harm done."

But the Doctor just stared after the Master's car and didn't reply.

"Doctor? Doctor! It _is_ over, isn't it?" Rory asked urgently, not liking the look on the Time Lord's face.

The Doctor tilted his head back, looking up into the sky. Nervously, Amy and Rory followed his line of sight. Overhead, instead of dispersing, the ominous clouds were blacker than ever, roiling into a peculiar funnel shape. Amy shuddered – it almost looked like a dark tunnelled pathway, leading somewhere she didn't even want to think about.

"Oh, it's far from over," the Doctor said softly. "I think it's only just beginning."

* * *

><p>Saxon Headquarters. A big, beautiful, well-appointed series of offices in the heart of London. The hub of his empire. As he walked along the thickly-carpeted passageways, the Master couldn't help looking around him with a small amount of nostalgia. He would almost be sorry to leave this place, when he took up residence in the newly-rebuilt 10 Downing Street in just a few days time. Almost, but not quite. Now that his plan was so close to fruition, he was constantly having to fight back the impatience welling up inside him. Eighteen months pretending to be one of these stupid, snivelling apes. How had he ever stood it? But in the end, when the entire Universe was at his mercy, it would be worth it.<p>

Lucy had returned home, in a separate car, to their luxury flat in Chelsea to get ready for the film premiere they were attending that evening. He had never been able to understand why it took women so damn long to get ready for anything. Hours and hours and hours, for Rassilon's sake! What did they _do_ in all that time? But in this case he was pleased to be rid of her. He had some pressing business of his own to attend to.

Reaching the entrance to his private office, he pushed the door open. Tejana was there, just as he had ordered, sitting in a chair facing the door, flanked on either side by his guards, her head bowed. Miss Dexter was also seated nearby, one elegantly-stockinged leg crossed over the other, patiently waiting. At his arrival, she rose deferentially to her feet.

But the Master had no eyes for her. Instead, his attention was riveted on the small, copper-haired figure. She was so tiny in this regeneration, so soft and delicate-looking, especially beside the hulking black forms of his guards. One might almost be fooled into thinking she was fragile and vulnerable. But the Master had known Tejana for a very long time and he was not fooled. He was more than aware that she was anything but fragile and vulnerable. She was stubborn, proud, wilful and determined. And when the occasion called for it, she could be as hard as nails and just as ruthless. It was as though, when designing her new appearance, the Universe had been playing one of its unfathomable jokes, making her exterior as different to her interior as it was possible to be.

She raised her head and met his gaze and, for the first time, he got a proper look at her face. Her eyes were a clear, true green, as green as the summer grass on Earth, set in an oval, lightly-tanned face with high cheekbones, framed with the tumbling mass of auburn hair. A shiver of shock passed through him, an inexplicable uneasiness crawling up his spine. Someone's death was in those eyes, he could see it. They were sad, so terribly, shatteringly sad. Dark shadows were etched under them like bruises. What the hell had happened since Malcaissaro to make her look like that? Had the Doctor died after all? No, that was impossible, he would have felt that. In fact, he was almost sure he had sensed the Doctor in the crowd outside Claridges that afternoon, but the feeling had slipped away in all the noise and confusion. Jack Harkness, then? No, Captain Freak couldn't die, he was some sort of unnatural fixed point in Time. That had been demonstrated clearly on Malcaissaro. Martha Jones? Hmmm...maybe...but he doubted that the loss of Martha would be enough to put such sheer devastation into Tejana's eyes. Whoever she had lost, it had been someone that meant everything to her, enough to rip a hole in her soul.

Still holding her gaze with his own, as though they were the only two people in the world, he walked forwards into the room.

"Get out!" he said to Dexter.

The woman bristled in surprise at his curt tone. "But, Sir, you said she was dangerous..."

The Master knew enough of Dexter's warped inclinations to guess that she was hoping he would order her to use some of her more interesting interrogation techniques on Tejana. Well, she could keep on hoping. No-one was going to touch this particular prisoner except him.

"You'll get out when I tell you to get out!" he snarled. "Now _go_, all of you!"

After a slight hesitation, Dexter nodded to the two guards and the three of them hurried from the room, closing the door behind them and leaving the Master and Tejana alone.

For a few tense moments, the two Time Lords just regarded each other silently.

Then the Master gathered himself together and gave her a mocking grin. "I looked into the crowd and what did I see? I saw _Tejana_ looking back at me!" he taunted in a childish, sing-song voice. Still smiling, he took a few steps forward until he was standing directly in front of her chair. "You didn't really think I wouldn't notice, did you? Welcome to Saxon Headquarters, Tejana. Welcome to _my_ world."


	6. Chapter 6

_**Author's Note: Thanks very much for reviewing the last chapter MayFairy, MountainLord-92, Theta'sWorstNightmare and xxTeam-Masterxx. Yet again, there seem to be loads of people who are reading without reviewing. If you like it, a bit of encouragement might be nice, yeah?**_

_**Anyway, here's the next bit...when Tejana's good, she's good. But when she's bad, she's very, very bad.**_

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><p><strong>CHAPTER SIX<strong>

"The Master's wife left in a separate car," the Doctor said, setting off again up the street, leaving his two companions to straggle after him. "Which means he's probably going back to Saxon Headquarters. Since the paradox is still building, I'm guessing that's where Tejana will be too."

"We'll never catch up with them if we have to walk all the way!" Amy puffed.

"Who said anything about walking?" the Doctor retorted, moving across to a small, blue car parked by the side of the road, his sonic screwdriver already in his hand.

"You can't just steal a car!" Rory protested, realising what the Time Lord had in mind.

"It's kind of an emergency, Rory!" the Doctor snapped, using the screwdriver to pop the lock on the driver's door. "What would the owner prefer, do you think? To have their car inconveniently moved across town, or to be wiped out of Time by a cataclysmic paradox? Gee, let me think...bit of a no-brainer, that one, really!"

"Fine, but I'm driving!" Amy told him, slipping calmly past the Doctor into the driver's seat, before he could argue. "You can give me directions."

"Amy!" Rory said in a shocked voice.

"What?" she replied. "You've seen him drive the TARDIS. Do you really want to let him behind the wheel of a car?"

"I would resent that, if we had the time!" the Doctor said huffily, before hurrying around to the front passenger door. "I've driven a car before, you know."

Once inside, he reached out with the screwdriver and used it to start the ignition. The engine of the little car sprang to life with a roar.

Reluctantly, realising they were about to leave without him, Rory hopped into the back seat.

"Great! Just brilliant!" he muttered. "Now I'm a member of a gang of inter-galactic car thieves."

"Just shut up and put your seat belt on!" Amy ordered as she jammed down the accelerator and the little car hurtled out into the street with a screech of tires.

* * *

><p>Tejana watched the Master walk towards her. That was all he did, just walk, but seeing it made her throat go dry and a shiver of heat run through her. It was something about the way his body was put together - not tall, but fine-boned and smooth muscled, every movement both graceful and powerful. He looked slightly more civilised in a suit, rather than the black hoodie and jeans she was accustomed to, but the sense of dominance was still there, the calm, arrogant confidence that he was the centre of the Universe and everything revolved around him.<p>

Whenever he came to her like this, with that intent, hungry look on his face, it usually meant there was only one thing he wanted from her. Automatically, without even thinking, she raised her face to him, ready to part her lips for his kiss. But then, looking into his mocking eyes, she remembered with a heart-wrenching ache that this was not her Koschei, not yet. While her Koschei would have been prepared to tear the Universe into tiny pieces to keep her with him, this man would be just as happy to kill her as to kiss her.

He was saying something now, probably something taunting and sarcastic, just as he always had, back in this timeline. She didn't care what it was, she wasn't even listening, just watching his lips move instead, remembering how good his mouth had felt as it moved hotly over her skin. A haze of unreality enveloped her. After Mnemosyne, she had never thought she would see him again. But how could she go on believing that he was dead, when he was standing right in front of her? How could she continue to grieve, when all she needed to do was to stretch out her hand and feel the warmth of him, feel his chest rise and fall with every breath he took?

"Good, isn't it?" he smirked triumphantly, leaning over her as she sat in the chair, trying to intimidate her. "In just a few days, I'll be Prime Minister of this pathetic little country. And then...oh and _then_...you have no idea of the fun I've got lined up for these stupid apes!"

Her double pulse thudded almost painfully at his nearness, prickles of desire shivering up her spine. She still didn't answer him, holding herself back from him, badly wanting to touch him, but afraid, so afraid, of what she might set in motion. During the Year That Never Was, she had often refused to speak to him when he addressed her, just staring at him coldly and defiantly, knowing that her stubbornness irritated him more than anything else. But it wasn't like that this time. This time, she honestly just didn't know what to say. She desperately wanted to tell him everything that had been burning in her hearts since he had died on Mnemosyne – how much she loved him, how much she missed him, how she could hardly bear to keep breathing without him. She wanted to tell him about their baby, how sorry she was she hadn't told him before, when she had the chance, on the beautiful, magical night she had worn his marriage flowers in her hair. But she couldn't. Not just because it would cause a history-destroying paradox, but because this Master would understand none of it. All he could hear was the relentless pounding of the drums in his head, driving him to kill and maim and destroy – the concepts of love and family and protection and belonging were all still completely alien to him.

But she couldn't be the Tejana she had been, either. The Tejana he was expecting. The Tejana who was full of hate and anger and fear towards him, wanting to kill him more than anything else. All of that was long gone and she didn't have the energy to pretend it was still there, not even to safeguard the causal nexus. So instead, she dropped her eyes away from his and said nothing at all, trying to hide the truth deep inside her.

However, it was much too late for that. Much, much too late.

"Oh, come on, Tejana...not sulking are we?" the Master taunted. "Ohhhh...didn't your little mission turn out quite the way you planned? Didn't expect to end up here, all alone with me, at my mercy? _Tough!_" Then, as she still refused to reply, keeping her eyes fixed on the floor, he growled, "Look at me, little girl. Look at your Master!"

She tried to turn her head away, but he was too quick. His right hand lashed out, digging into her hair and forcibly tilting her head back. "I said, LOOK AT ME!" he snarled.

Her eyes flew to meet his, green eyes striking sparks off brown, his touch in her hair seeming to burn like fire.

_Oh gods, the causal nexus...for him to see her was bad enough, but to touch her as well...what had she done?_

"That's better," he approved silkily, his other hand coming up to gently stroke the soft skin of her cheek. "Now then...tell me..._where's the Doctor_?"

* * *

><p>The blue car was stopped at a zebra crossing, waiting as a little old lady picked her way slowly across the street with the help of a Zimmer frame.<p>

The Doctor was sitting forward on his seat, every line of his body tense, almost as if he thought he could propel the car ahead with sheer force of will.

"Oh, for crying out loud!" Amy said impatiently, slamming her fists hard against the steering wheel in frustration. "Move it along, grandma!"

The old lady had almost reached the opposite curb, when suddenly she seemed to shimmer and jump, as though they were watching an old-fashioned film caught in a projector. Without warning, she disappeared and re-materialised again, on the far side of the road, right back where she had started from. Then she began to shuffle across the street again, leaning heavily on her frame, exactly as she had the first time, like an extreme case of de ja vu.

"What...the hell...just happened?" Rory breathed, staring at the pensioner in shock.

"Time is starting to haemorrhage," the Doctor said, the words firing out of his mouth like bullets from a gun. "The wound is growing deeper and more noticeable by the minute. And believe me, noticeable is _not_ what we want!" Then, as the old woman finally got out of their way, he added urgently, "Now _come on_, let's go!"

"Which way?" Amy demanded.

The Doctor pointed grimly towards the gyring funnel of unnatural black cloud, hovering like a whirling tornado in the air high ahead of them. "That way."

* * *

><p>The Master looked down at Tejana, his hand still buried in the silkiness of her hair, her head tilted back to reveal her slender, vulnerable throat. Again, he smelt the sweet, wild scent of honeysuckle. It was nothing artificial, like the heavy cloying scents worn by human women, it was the actual scent of her skin, warm and enticing, like a Gallifreyan summer. She was completely still, reminding him of a small animal hoping a predator would pass on by, her full lips slightly parted as she drew in tight, shallow breaths. Her eyes were locked with his, deep, green pools filled with an expression he didn't understand. There was no hatred there, no rage, nothing he remembered from their past encounters, just that indefinable sadness...and behind that, something else, some sort of yearning. Some sort of...softness.<p>

He swallowed hard and shoved the thought abruptly away. He was the Master. Whatever this was, whatever scheme she and the Doctor had cooked up between them to stop him, he wasn't going to fall for it. He had planned too long and hard for this. He had thought of every contingency, covered every one of his bases. Nothing was going to make him slip up this time.

"Still as stubborn as ever, I see?" he said harshly. "It doesn't make any difference, anyway, now that I have you. Because there's one thing I know for sure, he won't allow me to keep you – he'll be here soon to get you back."

To his surprise, a small, bitter smile quirked her lips and her eyes glittered with unshed tears. His sense of unease - of something being very wrong – deepened. Tejana had never cried easily, even when she was eight years old. And to cry in the presence of an enemy, especially him, that was something she would rather die than do.

He tightened his fist in her hair, trying to fight off the insidious effect she was having on him by intentionally hurting her. "This time I'm going to win," he said viciously. "No matter what it takes. Whatever he has in mind, I'm ready for him. I've been expecting him, laying traps for him all along. This will be the final battle and you can't stop me, either of you."

Slowly, she shook her head, as if he just didn't get it. "I'm not here to stop you, Koschei," she whispered, the first words he had heard her say, her voice low and sad.

His eyes widened, shock blasting through him as he heard her speak the name he had not used in centuries, a name he had never before heard on her lips. Somehow, just the sound of it tightened things in his lower body, stroking through him like a sensual song he had sung long ago but was only just beginning to remember.

"What did you call me?" he hissed.

* * *

><p>Spinning the wheel like a professional race car driver, Amy sent the car careening headlong up the street in the direction the Doctor had indicated.<p>

"Doctor, you said the wound in Time is growing more noticeable," Rory ventured, clutching white-knuckled at his seat as they screamed around a corner at top speed. "What did you mean? Who's going to notice it besides us?"

But the Doctor didn't answer, his eyes fixed grimly on the rapidly gathering clouds, as if he didn't even hear.

* * *

><p>Horrified at the mistake she had made, Tejana tried to pull away from the Master, but he wouldn't allow it. Instead, he slid his hands to her upper arms and pulled her roughly to her feet. Suddenly, it was hard to breathe, the air around them pulsing and electric with tension.<p>

"What. Did. You. Call. Me?" he snarled, shaking her like a rag doll.

She stared up into his angry face, feeling the unique, almost unbearable pleasure of his hard body pressed against hers, seeing the involuntary heat beginning to stir in his brown eyes, fully aware that her body was responding in kind, just as it always had.

"_Koschei!_" she cried, aware she was treading on dangerous ground, edging closer and closer to disaster, but she was unable to help herself. Her skin was aching for his touch. "I called you _Koschei_!"

His face hardened at the sound of his name, his eyes blazing as his body recognised the need in hers. His hands tightened on her upper arms, the heat between them making her catch her breath in sudden realisation. He wanted her, he wanted her so badly, it was like a fever inside him. Once, he could have hidden it from her, fighting the desire with anger and hatred, as he had for so long during The Year That Never Was. But she was not the same person any more. She had belonged to him, body and soul - had shared his bed and his life, had been in his mind and in his dreams. Now nothing could be hidden between them, no matter how hard he tried.

"Why are you really here, Tejana?" he ground out, his self-control evidently hanging by a thread. "You say you're not here to stop me...then what the hell do you want from me?"

He was holding her so closely to him, she could sense his double heartbeat, rapidly pounding in perfect synchronicity with the drums in his head. Her own pulse sped up in response, a wave of desire searing through her. What did she want from him? The answer to that was simple..._everything_. She wanted everything from him. Everything he could give. Everything she could not have, not without breaking the Laws of Time. And she couldn't do that, could she? Every rational instinct told her she had to pull away from him. She had to stop this, _now_. But then he moved his head down, and his mouth was so close to hers, so very close. _Oh gods, Koschei... _The need for his kiss burnt so sharply inside her that it was almost physically painful. Suddenly, with an acute flash of anger and rebellion, she realised she didn't care any more about the possible repercussions. So what if she changed the course of human history? What the hell did it matter? She was the last Time Lady of Gallifrey. The Master was her life-mate. It was her _right_.

_The Laws of Time are mine and they will obey me_, she thought defiantly. _Isn't that how it goes, Doctor?_

And with that, she stopped thinking altogether and pressed her lips passionately against the Master's.


	7. Chapter 7

**Author's Note: Hi all. Thank you very much to the following people for reviewing the last chapter: kie1993, Theta'sWorstNightmare, Imorgen, MountainLord-92, LexySummers, MayFairy and the very nice anonymous person!  
><strong>

**Was going to write other stuff, but feeling tired today, so I won't.**

**Fair bit of sexual content in this one - if you are not old enough to read, or if that sort of thing offends you, please don't read, OK? I could do without any hassles.  
><strong>

* * *

><p><strong>CHAPTER<strong>** SEVEN**

The Doctor stared out the window of the car as Amy drove, horrified at what he saw on the streets of London. The temporal "hot-spots" were everywhere now, tiny little hiccups in Time, with dozens of humans repeating what they had just done and then going on, as if nothing unusual had happened. It gave the surrounding city a surreal quality, like trying to watch a television show while a capricious child was playing with the remote-control.

The worst part was, even though Tejana was the one who had caused this, he couldn't help blaming himself. He had travelled to thousands of worlds, cast fear into the hearts of evil creatures across constellations, saved the entire Universe from destruction too many times to count. The Doctor - the Oncoming Storm, the Destroyer of Worlds - the man who supposedly made things better. But when it came to healing the people he loved, that...oh, _that_ he was not so good at. Instead of trying to help the Master back on Gallifrey when they were young, he had simply left him behind. When the Bad Wolf had made Jack a fixed point in time, he had run as far away from him as he could. Instead of telling Rose that he loved her, instead of claiming her for his own, he had taken the coward's way out and abandoned her in Pete's World with his clone. And now, when his daughter needed him most, he had let her down, unable to reach out to her, leaving her to be driven to the ultimate recklessness by her grief and loss.

"Oh my God, this is way beyond bizarre!" Rory said in disbelief, watching cars going around a roundabout, only to disappear and then reappear again, before completing yet another circuit. "Why isn't anyone noticing this is happening except us?"

"Travelling within the Time Vortex changes the way you see the Universe forever, makes you more sensitive to temporal fluctuations," the Doctor replied. "To an ordinary human, time seems to be flowing normally, because their tiny little minds can't fathom anything any different. But you can see the truth, that it's all slowly starting to splinter and break down."

"But what about Tejana?" Amy asked, hunched desperately over the steering wheel as she tried to negotiate the bewildering tangle of appearing and disappearing cars. "I've seen her sense temporal distortion before, like an itch on her skin. Why isn't she picking up on all this? And the Master's a Time Lord too, he should be able to feel it, shouldn't he?"

"They can't sense it because they're the ones causing it," the Doctor said. "They're at the eye of the storm. Which is why we have to stop them, before it's too late."

* * *

><p>The Master froze in shock, feeling Tejana's soft lips brush his, tantalizing and tempting, parted and moist in explicit invitation. She tasted like wine, heady and potent and somehow illicit, like the promise of dark, erotic nights and urgent, driving passion.<p>

What the hell was going on? Was _this_ the Doctor's plan? For Tejana to distract him by seducing him? But no, surely not, that wasn't something his saintly arch-enemy would do, bartering his own daughter like that. And Tejana was far too proud to ever allow it.

But here she was, trembling under his hands, her mouth searching his, as if he was the only thing she would ever want. Unexpected lust shot through him, pleasure searing through his veins as he felt his body harden in heated response to hers, a need more primitive than anything he'd ever felt before. With that, everything changed and suddenly he was the one controlling the kiss. One hand came up to tangle in the long cascade of her hair, holding her still while his mouth ravaged hers, the other splayed across her back, just below her waist, angling her hips to his. She didn't struggle or try to fight him in any way. Instead, she slid her arms around his neck and held him closer, kissed him harder, her tongue twining with his, matching every move he made, as though she had done it a thousand times before and knew just how to arouse him, just how to drive him wild. Without quite knowing how it had happened, he realised he had slammed her back against the nearby wall, his hands pinning her wrists as he kissed her, so that the entire front of her body was pressed against him and he could feel every inch of her. Breathing hard, he dragged his mouth from hers and looked down into her face.

"You shouldn't start something you won't want to finish, little girl," he rasped, fighting for control of himself.

Her cheeks were flushed, her lips swollen from his savage kisses. But the look in her eyes was one of pure, unbridled desire.

"Who says I don't want to finish it?" she responded defiantly. "And, just so you know, I haven't been a little girl for a very, _very_ long time."

He had a sudden piercing vision of a tiny blonde girl wildly hurling tomatoes at a white wall, her face twisted in pain, so long ago now. There had been many times in the passing years when he had wondered if he had done the wrong thing back then, if perhaps he should have taken her with him instead of leaving her behind on Gallifrey. She had been such a sad, lonely little girl, so desperate for someone to cling to. It would have been so easy to manipulate her, so easy to talk her into going with him. And what sweet revenge would it have been on the Doctor, to know that his daughter's loyalty was no longer with him, but with the Master instead. But in this moment, looking down into her heated green eyes, he had no regrets at all. If she had gone with him when she was a child, she would have seen him as a father figure, a replacement for the Doctor. Feeling her soft, delicate body crushed against his, he knew that sort of relationship was the last thing he wanted.

Unable to hold back any longer, he kissed her again, his mouth hard and possessive, taking her lips and then tracing along her jaw, before moving to the sensitive spot beneath her ear. Tejana drew in a tight breath, moaning low in her throat, tilting her head back so he could explore the long line of her throat.

"_Mekhil_," she whispered. "_Amin Mekhil!_"

_Master...my Master..._

The words shuddered through him. She was so small and vulnerable against him, his, all his, for the taking, as and how he pleased. He had no idea what this strange turn-around was all about and suddenly he didn't care, her unlooked-for submission exciting him more than anything else ever could have.

"Say it again!" he demanded. She tugged against his hold, but still he gripped her hands, caressing her with his lips and tongue and teeth, kissing and licking and biting down her neck until she writhed against him in pleasure. "_Again_, Tejana!"

"_Amin Mekhil._" Her voice was almost a sob, trembling and husky with need.

All rational thought left him. Right now, in this tiny fragment of Time, there was no grand plan to follow, no Doctor to fight, no Universe to conquer. There was just her. Just him. Just the white heat rising between them. Just the driving lust he ached so badly to satisfy.

Picking her up, he carried her to the comfortable couch at the back of the room.

* * *

><p>"Here!" the Doctor exclaimed. "Stop here!"<p>

Amy slammed on the brakes and skewed the small car to an immediate halt, ending up half on the footpath and half on the road. Rory groaned theatrically. "And I thought we were supposed to be worried about the Doctor's driving. I always _said_ you would never have passed that driving test if you hadn't been wearing a short skirt."

"Oi, I got you here, didn't I?" Amy retorted. "Stop complaining, stupid-face."

The Doctor wasn't listening to their bickering. He had already climbed out of the car and was looking across the road at an elegant doorway, where two more of the black-clad guards were standing, one on each side. Above them, a discreet sign read "Saxon Party Campaign Headquarters."

They were in a quiet street in one of London's premier financial districts, not far from Canary Wharf. Up and down the street, the Doctor could see dozens and dozens of people repeating the same action over and over again, like some kind of strange pantomime. The temporal distortion was so severe here that the Time Lord nearly staggered, the twisted sensation making him feel physically ill. Directly overhead, as if drawn to the building like a magnet, the peculiar funnel of cloud boiled and churned, growing by the minute.

"It's getting dark," Amy said, getting out of the driver's seat and closing the car door behind her. "Doctor...it's only three o'clock in the afternoon...why is it so dark?"

Sure enough, a heavy, grey twilight seemed to have descended like an unpleasant blanket, wrapping the city in gloom. A cold, eerie wind was blowing, a mournful lament that raised the hairs on the back of the Doctor's neck.

"They're coming," he said sharply, striding across the street. "We don't have much time. We have to get to Tejana, _now_!"

"Who's coming?" Rory demanded.

"The Reapers!" the Doctor replied. "Creatures that live in the Time Vortex. When there's a big enough wound in Time, they can sense it and they come to sterilise it."

"Sterilise it?" Amy quavered. "What do you mean, sterilise it?"

"They're like white blood cells in the human body, always on the look-out for infection. And when they find one, they surround it and devour it. Those clouds up there are actually a gateway into the Time Vortex. If this paradox gets any worse, the gateway will open and the Reapers will come through."

"And?" Rory asked fearfully.

"And I'm not sure I'll be able to do anything to stop them from devouring the entire city of London."

* * *

><p>Tejana was drowning in sensation. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she knew this was wrong. The mouth that claimed hers, the hands that pulled open her shirt and searched her body, the lithe, hard body that lay on top of her...they didn't belong to her Koschei. This was Harold Saxon. Her Koschei was dead. But the taste of him, the warm, aroused smell of his skin, the incredible feeling of his hands on her, his touch bold and sure and dominant...it was all so achingly familiar and she wanted it so much, <em>so much<em>.

There was no gentleness in their embrace, just a head-on collision of their bodies as he took what he wanted and she allowed him to do it, every part of her hungry and out of control.

"Yes, oh yes," she cried, the touch of his lips and tongue on her naked breast sending fire streaking through her body. She arched helplessly against him, her head swimming with memories. He'd always been able to do this to her, always finding new ways to bring her to the edge, always knowing when to tease and when to demand, playing her like an instrument until her whole body sang.

Then his right hand was sliding downwards, tracing sensually across her bare skin, heading for the button of her jeans, inexorable, unstoppable...until it smoothed over the slight mound of her stomach.

With a muffled curse, he stopped short with his hand on her belly, as still as if he had been turned to stone.

"You're pregnant!" he spat furiously.

Reality crashed in around her like a tidal wave. The baby! Oh gods, what was she doing? He couldn't know the truth about the baby. That would turn the causal nexus inside out.

At last she began to struggle, trying to get away from him. But he pinned her easily with his weight, refusing to allow her to move.

"Whose is it? Who have you been sleeping with?" he demanded, his face tight with menace. "Is it Captain Freak's, Tejana? _Is it?_"

Trapped beneath him, completely out of options, Tejana knew she had to lie. As much as it hurt, as much as it stripped her soul to do it, she had to tell him the baby was Jack's, there was no other way. But before she could open her mouth, something happened that she couldn't control. With the Master's hand upon her belly, as if sensing and responding to his father's touch, the baby chose to move for the very first time, pushing solidly against his father's hand. And in that moment, with the three of them joined so intimately together, the psychic link opened and the Master knew.

"He's mine!" he gasped in disbelief. "You're carrying my son!"


	8. Chapter 8

**Author's Note**: **Hi everyone. Sorry for slow update, but it's summer here and there's been lots to do. Also, there's been some sort of updating glitch, which is a bit annoying. Anyway, thanks very much to MayFairy, Theta'sWorstNightmare, kie1993, Imorgen, MountainLord-92, SawManiac211, KlinicallyInsane Koschei (x7), shouldreallygetanffacount, mericat, Bernice-Summerfield (x 3), Lexy Summers and Dryu (x 7) for all your kind reviews. Much, much appreciated!**

**Thanks also to MayFairy for listening to me complain, the other day, LOL! I officially dedicate this chapter to you!**

* * *

><p><strong>CHAPTER EIGHT<strong>

"So how to we get past those men and get in there?" Amy asked in a low voice, eyeing the tall, beefy, armed-to-the-teeth guards with some concern.

"Simple," the Doctor said, reaching into his pocket as they approached the stairs leading up to the doorway. "We'll use my psychic paper. Tell them we're government officials or something."

"As long as I'm not Amy's eunuch this time," Rory grouched sourly, remembering the last time they had used the psychic paper, back in Venice.

"Why don't you just admit you _loved _being my eunuch?" Amy teased back, poking him playfully in the ribs.

Meanwhile, the Doctor was patting frantically at his pockets, pulling out any number of odd things and shoving them back in, but with no trace at all of the psychic paper. "Oh, no, no, no. It's gone! How can it be gone? How can it possibly, in any conceivable way at all, be gone?"

"Maybe you dropped it somewhere?" Amy suggested.

"I don't just _drop_ things, Pond," the Doctor snapped.

"What now then?" Rory queried, watching the guards nervously. "Only, it looks like they've noticed us, Doctor, so you'd better come up with something fast."

"We'll try asking nicely," the Doctor answered, before marching confidently up the stairs towards the entrance.

"_Asking NICELY?_" Rory mouthed silently at Amy, an incredulous expression on his face. Somehow, it didn't strike him as the most workable plan the Time Lord had ever come up with. Amy merely shrugged and hurried up the stairs in the Doctor's wake, towing her reluctant husband behind her.

"Yes?" one of the guards spoke up, glaring at them in a forbidding manner. "Can I help you?"

"Hello, I'm the Doctor. I need to see Mr Saxon right away."

"Yeah, you and everyone else, mate," the guard smirked. "I wouldn't hold your breath." He was dark-haired and very good-looking, in a thuggish sort of way.

The Doctor disliked him immediately. "It's really not a good day to make me angry, you know," he said in a mild voice with a distinct undertone of steel. "As it happens, I'm UNIT's scientific advisor and it's very important that I speak to Mr Saxon as soon as possible."

"Is that right, Sir?" the guard drawled. "Well, then you won't mind showing me some ID, will you?"

"Not at all," the Doctor said, calmly offering him an identification card. The dark-haired man took it and glanced at it. Unfortunately, the Doctor had forgotten that, unlike Torchwood, UNIT _did_ give out photographic ID cards to their operatives. The guard squinted closely at the picture, which showed a man in his fifties, with curly white hair and a big, pointy nose.

"This isn't you!" he exclaimed, eyeing the Doctor's youthful appearance with renewed suspicion.

The Doctor snatched the card back and pocketed it hurriedly. "Yes, well, it was taken quite a while ago, you know. The point is, UNIT have reason to believe that Mr Saxon could be in extreme danger."

"UNIT?" the second guard muttered to himself, staring in absorbed fascination at the Doctor and his two companions. "First Torchwood and now UNIT? What the hell is going on today?"

"Torchwood?" the Doctor said, his sharp ears picking up on the comment and rounding on the man abruptly. "You've seen someone from Torchwood here today?"

The guard, a big blonde man wearing sergeant's stripes, gave him a brief nod. "Not here. Back at Claridges, when Mr Saxon gave his speech earlier. She said she was there as an undercover observer."

"She didn't happen to be around five foot two with long ginger-ish hair, by any chance?"

"Yeah, that's her. Sexy little thing," the man answered, a small, nostalgic grin forming on his face as he mentally pictured Tejana. "Why, what's she got to do with this? What sort of danger is Mr Saxon in? Are there aliens after him or something?"

"Yeah, you could say that," the Doctor responded, keeping his face perfectly straight. "What happened to the girl? Where did she go?"

The sergeant shrugged. "Dunno. I was going to ask her out on a date, but she just disappeared into the crowd, before I could even get her phone number."

"Trust me, Sergeant, you should count yourself lucky - you'd never be able to handle her," the Doctor said wryly. "Now, this is very, very, extremely important. It could be a matter of life or death. I need you to tell Mr Saxon that the Doctor is here and wants to see him, right away! I'm guessing he'll be only too happy to see me. We're very old friends."

"Doctor," Rory cut in, tugging at the Time Lord's arm.

"Not now, Rory," the Doctor replied irritably, keeping his eyes fixed on the guard in front of him. "This nice man is just about to help us, aren't you, Sergeant?"

"No, really, Doctor...you have to look!"

With an impatient sigh, the Time Lord spun back to his companions and snapped, "Honestly, Rory, can't you see I'm trying to...?"

But both Rory and Amy were staring up at the ever-darkening horizon. The air was icy with expectation, their breath condensing before them into frigid misty clouds. There was no other sound, the entire world suddenly unnaturally silent, except for the high, eerie song of the wind, howling through the sky. The roiling black clouds were swelling obscenely, like a huge, pus-filled boil, the dark passageway in the centre growing wider and wider, as though something unimaginable was pushing its way through.

"Oh, Tejana," the Doctor whispered in horror, knowing his daughter must have somehow gone much too far, completely compromising the causal nexus. "What have you done?"

Even as he spoke, the whirling vortex ripped asunder, like a curtain tearing from top to bottom, and a huge creature appeared in a blaze of crimson light, hovering ominously above London, its dark, scaly wings flapping gently. It had a sleek, tricorne head, glittering red eyes, four long hooked arms and – embedded in the centre of its chest - a greedy, fanged mouth, its gaping jaws working in rhythm with the undulation of its wings. A curved tail shaped horribly like a scythe coiled behind it, blade-sharp and lethal. Panicked screams of terror echoed along the city streets, as the humans looked up to see the alien visitation descending on them and ran in fear.

"Jesus, Mary and Joseph! What in the name of God_ is_ it?" the Sergeant breathed.

"It's a Reaper!" the Doctor yelled. "Get inside, all of you...NOW!"

Without stopping to argue further, the Sergeant pushed frantically at the shiny, black-painted door, swinging it wide and rushing through it. The Doctor grabbed Amy and Rory by their arms and shoved them roughly in front of him, thrusting them through the doorway to safety, just as the Reaper began to swoop.

Looking back, the Time Lord saw that the dark-haired guard had ignored their retreat, confidently going down on one knee in a smooth, practised motion, his automatic weapon already in his hands.

"No!" the Doctor shouted. "Don't!"

But the sharp, staccato sound of gunfire sliced through the still air, as the guard stubbornly emptied round after round into the oncoming creature. The barrage of ammunition had no effect at all. The thing just kept on descending, absorbing the bullets into its rock-like skin as it came, the mouth in its chest yawning cavernously in primordial hunger. Its leathery wings swept wide and then closed around the still-firing guard, drawing him into an intimate embrace and sinking its stomach-fangs into his vulnerable neck. There was a terrible scream and a bright flash of pure white light. The Reaper's wings unfurled once more, revealing no trace of the soldier, and the creature rose again into the nightmare-coloured sky, searching for new victims.

Fresh scarlet flashes exploded from the Vortex gateway and more Reapers appeared, winging their way across the hellish horizon like giant vampire bats. The Doctor slammed the heavy door shut and leaned against it, closing out the blood-curdling sight.

The Sergeant was slumped against the wall, panting like a dog, his face twisted in fear. For a man who had previously been excited by the thought of aliens, he seemed to have gone off the idea remarkably quickly, the Doctor thought ironically.

"Those things..." he gasped.

"They're Reapers," the Doctor told him. "This building is stone and probably relatively old, as far as Earth buildings go, which may keep them out for a while. But not for long. They've come through the Time Vortex to find and correct a problem in the causal nexus – a problem which, I'm guessing, is currently located in Mr Saxon's office. So, unless you want those things out there to consume everything and everyone you've ever known, I suggest you get me up there, right now!"

* * *

><p>"He's mine!" the Master gasped in disbelief. "You're carrying my son!"<p>

Tejana gazed up at him, tears sparkling in her eyes, feeling the warmth of his hand on her belly, drinking in his expression of amazement and awe as he sensed the tiny spark of life that was his son, the baby reaching out to him within the psychic link, recognising and welcoming him as his father. In that one beautiful moment, selfish or not, she knew it had all been worth it. She would happily have traded everything she had ever had, just to see that transfixed, euphoric look on his face, the look she had never had the chance to experience back on Mnemosyne, because he had died before she could tell him about their child. Whatever else happened now, that look would stay in her hearts, a treasure she would hold for all eternity.

But then his gaze snapped back into focus and he pulled his hand away as though her skin had burned him.

"Correct me if I'm wrong, but as far as I know, we've never actually had sex," he said caustically. "So, unless I'm suddenly supposed to start believing in miracles, you're not from this time-line, are you?" Lightning-fast, his hand moved to grip the left side of her throat, just under her ear. His thumb brought her chin up hard, making her look him in the eye. Tejana couldn't help trembling at the strength in his fingers, knowing just how easy it would be for him to snap the slender column of her neck, if he chose to do so. "No wonder I've never seen you in this regeneration before. So how far in my future are you from, Tejana? And how the hell do you end up pregnant with my child?"

Overhead, glowing through the ornate stained-glass sky-light set in the ceiling, a succession of weird, scarlet flashes of light shimmered across the darkening sky like a slowly spreading pool of blood. But the two Time Lords were far too engrossed in each other to notice anything else.

"You know I can't tell you that, Koschei," she said pleadingly. "Please, you have to let me go. Who knows what damage I may have done to the causal nexus already, just by being here?"

"I'm the _Master_! I don't _have_ to do anything," he snarled, his thumb digging into the soft, vulnerable skin of her throat, forcing her head back painfully. But then, as suddenly as he had grabbed her, he relaxed his iron grasp, cupping her chin softly instead, his narrowed brown eyes studying her curiously, almost wonderingly. "You keep calling me Koschei, as if it comes naturally to you, as if you do it all the time." His fingers stroked gently down her cheek and she closed her eyes, automatically nestling into his hand, both her hearts contracting at the poignancy of the familiar caress. "And _look _at you...after centuries of us being enemies, there's no hate for me left in you at all, is there? You actually welcome my touch. And you came here looking for me, intending to stand at the back of the crowd without being seen. Why, Tejana? If I had known you were pregnant with my son in the future, I would never have let you get away from me, no matter what happened. So why are you here alone, searching for me in an earlier time-line than your own?"

She didn't answer, her green eyes jewel-bright with unshed tears as she stared silently back at him, the anguish burning uncontrollably in her chest.

"Why, Tejana?" he shouted, tightening his hand on her again, threat written in every line of his body. "_Tell me why!_"

"Because you _died_!" she screamed back, unable to take it any more, bitter anger at him for leaving her unexpectedly swelling up through her sorrow. "You died, Koschei! I _loved_ you and I never even had a chance to say goodbye. I never had a chance to tell you about our child. I never meant for any of this to happen, but I had to see you, just one more time!"

He stared at her in shock, as if she had just slapped him viciously across the face. What he would have said, she never knew, because at that moment, the door flew open with a bang.

The Master snapped his head around and glared furiously at the tall, lanky man with the floppy brown hair and bow-tie standing framed in the doorway.

"Well, hello, Doctor!" he sneered with a mocking grin.

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><p><em><strong>Another Author's Note: Just in case anyone is wondering where the Doctor's psychic paper got to, the Master pinched it in "The Master's Rose."<strong> **:)**_


	9. Chapter 9

_**Author's Note: Thanks to the following people for reviewing – MountainLord-92, Catelly, KlinicallyInsaneKoschei, mericat, MayFairy, SawManiac211, kie1993, Theta'sWorstNightmare, Imorgen, Dryu and Lexy Summers. I very much appreciate your courtesy in giving me some feedback.**_

_**Here's more.**_

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><p><strong>CHAPTER NINE<strong>

The Doctor stood in the doorway of Harold Saxon's office, his eyes rapidly scanning the room. It was beautiful and very comfortable, tastefully decorated in accents of green, with a wide expanse of soft, cream-coloured carpet and pale ecru walls. The furniture was both sumptuous and elegant, particularly the large, polished desk that dominated the room. There were no windows except for the ornate domed skylight overhead, the multi-hued stained glass glowing periodically as the lurid flashes of crimson light still pulsed across the sky.

But the Doctor's attention was fixed on the plush leather couch at the back of the room on which his daughter lay, her long copper hair tumbling around her in bright disarray, her shirt wide open to the waist, clearly revealing her small, high breasts. The Master hovered over her, half sitting and half lying, his own shirt gaping, his tie and jacket carelessly discarded on the floor. It wasn't too difficult to figure out exactly what they had been doing and why the causal nexus had been ripped apart.

For a moment, the Doctor felt an overwhelming surge of anger at his daughter's incredible selfishness and irresponsibility. But then his eyes met hers and his fury melted away into a wave of pain and compassion. Despite seeing him in the doorway, she made no move to cover herself. Even worse, her gaze contained none of the rebellion and defiance he expected. Instead, her green eyes were wide and blank, as though she had retreated to a safe place far inside herself, rather than deal with the reality of what she had done.

Tejana had always been a fighter, first and foremost. Her pride had never allowed her to admit defeat, her stubbornness had never permitted her to lay down and die, no matter what happened. The Doctor had never thought he would see the day when she would be this indifferent, this passive, this...broken and destroyed. And it killed him inside, because he hadn't realised when he should have, and because he had done nothing to help her.

The Master's head whirled around and a taunting grin spread across his face as he saw his old enemy.

"Well, hello, Doctor."

The Doctor stepped into the room, with Amy and Rory following closely behind. Rory took one look at the scene on the couch and blushed to the roots of his hair, before averting his eyes pointedly to the floor. Amy, on the other hand, was taking it all in with great interest, particularly the tantalising view of the Master's lean, muscular chest. Crossly, Rory put his hand over her eyes, only to have her push it away.

"End of the world, Rory," she reminded him in an impatient voice. "Not exactly the best time to worry about my modesty, is it?"

The Doctor put his hands in his pockets and stood casually facing the Master, his posture relaxed, his chin tilted and his gaze steady and serious as he watched the other man get to his feet. He had to play this very, very carefully, for all their sakes. He wasn't sure how much of the situation the other Time Lord already understood and the Master of this time-line had always been extremely unpredictable and difficult to deal with – sadistic, malicious and as capricious as a child. He was also more than a little insane. But, somehow, the Doctor had to convince him that letting Tejana go was in his best interests, without telling him any more than he had to.

"Hello, Master."

The Master looked him up and down, his expression one of pure contempt. "So, a new regeneration for you too, Doctor. I guess that means you're from the future as well, just like our dear little Tejana here."

With that, he pulled Tejana up from the couch into his encircling arms, holding her close to his naked chest in an imprisoning embrace that was more of a threat than a caress. One glance at his daughter's pale face soon confirmed to the Doctor that he wasn't going to get any help from her direction. She was completely unresponsive, allowing the Master to handle her like a doll. The Doctor felt cold fear for her twisting between his hearts. The Tejana he knew would never stand passively by while the two men she loved fought over her, like two dogs over a bone. It was as if her grief and despair had swallowed her whole and she just didn't care any more.

He walked further into the room, careful not to make any sudden moves.

"If you know that, then you must realise you have to let her go," he said to the Master, choosing his words cautiously, aware that any further escalation in the paradox would instantly draw the hunting Reapers to them like sharks sniffing out blood. "She needs to come with me, before the causal nexus is totally compromised."

"Is that right?" the Master mocked. "Oh, but Doctor, are you so sure she even wants to go with you? Maybe she'd rather stay right here. After all, _she _came looking for _me_, remember?"

"She's...not herself at the moment. She doesn't know what she's doing."

The Master's expression tightened in sudden anger, both his hands moving to possessively cradle Tejana's belly. "She's pregnant with my _son_!"

The Doctor flinched. He had really, really hoped he had managed to get here in time, before the Master discovered the truth about the baby. Reasoning with him now was going to be close to impossible and they were running out of time.

The other Time Lord must have caught his look of dismay, because he smiled even more mockingly. "Oh, Doctor, did you really think I wouldn't figure it out? My son. Your _grandson_. How about that, huh? Who would have thought? I guess that makes us one big, happy family now, doesn't it..._Dad_?"

"That's a matter for the future. You know perfectly well we can't talk about it now!" the Doctor retorted. "The Laws of Time..."

"_Don't_ lecture me about the Laws of Time, you sanctimonious idiot!" the Master spat. "You don't get it, do you? You never did, even when we were kids. We're_ Time Lords_! If we don't like the future, we can just change it, because that's our _right_! And, believe me, if I'm going to die before my son is born, that future is not acceptable to me and I'm not going to allow it to happen. So from now on, for as long as she's carrying my child, your precious daughter stays right here with me!"

"_You're_ the one who never understood the Laws of Cause and Effect!" the Doctor responded, his eyes blazing with anger, all caution now thrown to the winds. "You didn't understand it on Logopolis and you don't understand it now! When will you learn that every change you make has _consequences?_"

"Consequences that I can easily avert," the Master interrupted arrogantly. "In just a few short days, my masterpiece will be complete - my Paradox Machine, built with my own hands from the bones of your decrepit old TARDIS, Doctor. And once I activate it, I'll be able to bend Time to my will, in any way I choose. And what I choose is to _keep my son_!"

"Except that you don't have those few short days! Right now, we're lucky if we have minutes!"

"What are you talking about?"

"Those consequences that you say you can so easily avert? They're up there already, flying around over London!" the Doctor snapped, pointing up towards the skylight above them. "Reapers, dozens of them! They've come through from the Time Vortex and they're hunting down the anomaly that called them into this world – in other words, the paradox caused by you and Tejana being together!"

For a moment, the Master merely stared at him. Then he threw back his head and laughed uproariously. "_Reapers? _ Oh, come on, Doctor – you can do better than that! The Reapers are nothing more than a Gallifreyan fairy tale, meant to scare little Time Tots with the oh-so-terrible dangers of creating a paradox. They don't really exist."

"Do I _look _like I'm joking?" the Doctor shot back. "For once in your life, just _listen_! Can't you hear the people screaming outside? The Reapers are devouring London even as we speak."

Sure enough, once everyone stopped speaking, a distorted medley of high-pitched screams of terror could be heard drifting up from the street below, echoing faintly around the luxurious top floor office. For the first time, the Master began to look a bit uncertain. "No," he muttered. "No, that isn't possible."

At that moment, a frantic Miss Dexter pushed past the Doctor into the office. "Mr Saxon!" she gasped. "Sir, there are monsters out in the streets. Big, winged creatures, like vampire bats! They're killing everyone in sight. We have to get you to safety immediately."

The Master stared incredulously at his trusted employee, knowing she would never lie to him, and then looked back at the Doctor, disbelief written across his handsome face.

"You see now? I'm telling the truth!" the Doctor said urgently. "Give Tejana back to me. She's the one causing the paradox. If I can get her back within the protective temporal fields inside the TARDIS, maybe we can manage to reverse all this, like drawing the thorn out of an infected wound. If there's no paradox for them to hunt, the Reapers might go back where they came from."

But before the Master could answer, an enormous black shadow passed over them, blotting out the light and enveloping the room in a freezing, bone-deep cold. Everyone looked up, their heads angling back in a weird sort of unison, their eyes inexorably drawn to the skylight above, as if by some huge, terrible magnet.

"Too late!" the Doctor groaned. "They've found us."

Then the world seemed to tilt and the skylight shattered into a million lethal, glittering shards, like a storm of crystal rain. But instead of falling down into the room, the jagged prisms of glass just hung sparkling in the air, as if frozen in time, the crimson light refracting through them like huge drops of blood.

And there, in the middle of it all, appeared the Reaper, its great wings slowly beating against the cold, heavy silence, its beady eyes fixed hungrily on its prey in the room below.


	10. Chapter 10

_**Author's Note:**_

_**Good afternoon, humans. Here is another chapter – this story is getting near the end now, so I might actually finish something for once, hooray for me. Thanks as always to the wonderful people who reviewed the last chapter – Bernice-Summerfield, Theta'sWorstNightmare, kie1993, MountainLord-92, SawManiac211, Lexy Summers, dryu, Imorgen, mericat, Writless, irishartemis and Aietradaea (x 9).**_

_**Big welcome back to Aietradaea – lovely to have you here, my friend!**_

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><p><strong>CHAPTER TEN<strong>

Tejana saw her father's face as he stood in the doorway and, somewhere in the distant reaches of her mind, she knew he was angry.

Very, very angry.

She had an idea that she should know why, but she wasn't quite sure any more. Nor could she bring herself to care. Everything seemed to be a bit foggy and unclear. All the adrenaline that had brought her to this point seemed to have seeped away, leaving her inert and lifeless. She could remember screaming at the Master, but she couldn't recall what about. Something vital had snapped inside her, and her grasp on reality had ebbed away, like the elusive tide receding back down a sandy beach.

The room seemed to be choked with words, rebounding back and forth between the Doctor and the Master, but none of them made any sense to her. They may as well have been speaking an unknown language for all the impact their argument had on her.

Then the Master pulled her from the couch and into his encircling arms, hauling her hard against his body. Everything seemed so much better after that, even though he was holding her very tightly and the angry words kept coming, pressing down on her, sucking away her air, making it difficult to breathe. She wanted to yell at them both to stop, that they were hurting her head, but it all seemed like too much effort. So instead she closed her eyes and leant her cheek against the naked warmth of the Master's chest. To her relief, the white noise of their arguing faded away and all she could hear was the steady pounding of his double heartbeat under her ear, just as she had heard it so many times before, alive and comforting and strong, making her feel secure and protected. His hands slid down to her belly, cradling their child, and joy blazed in her soul. Even though she was a little confused about where they were and what was happening, none of that mattered - the three of them were together, she and Koschei and their child, just as it was supposed to be.

Dexter's panicked arrival barely even registered with her, enfolded as she was in her own idealised reality. Sheltered in the Master's arms, insulated from her grief and anguish, she was completely disconnected from what was going on around her.

But even her self-imposed isolation could not protect her from the great shadow that fell across the room, bringing the icy wind of death in its wake, its presence compelling her like a voice calling her name.

Moving like a sleep walker, the atmosphere clinging thick and gelid around her, she looked up and saw the huge skylight shattering directly above them. Her eyes widened and she stared, fascinated, as the spectacular fragments of rainbow-coloured glass hung suspended delicately in the air. It was beautiful, so achingly beautiful, the shining shards glowing like falling tears against the eerie background of the vermilion sky.

And then the Reaper appeared out of nowhere, hovering over her like a dark, impossible angel, its mighty wings flapping in a slow, hypnotic rhythm, the breeze of them gently stirring her hair. Its eyes were like fiery rubies, gazing sternly down at her, ancient and undying, emotionless and implacable.

In that one chilling, timeless moment, when their eyes met, she understood with every particle of her being that the creature was here for her. She had called it into this world and it had come. She had transgressed the Law of Time and now she would be punished. Strangely enough, despite the sure and certain knowledge, she felt no fear, no desire to run or to hide. Instead, a kind of peaceful tranquillity filled her. This was right, it was proper, it had to be. Somehow, there was a beautiful simplicity in the unchangeable inevitability of it. She could vaguely hear someone shouting in the background, but it meant nothing to her. Nothing existed any more, nothing except for her and the Reaper who had come for her, nothing but its compelling ruby eyes and the lulling beat of its enormous wings. As if in a dream, she tilted her head back, baring her neck to the dark creature, docilely watching it descend towards her and waiting for it to claim her.

But before it could take her, she felt strong hands lifting her and she was whirling through the air, out of the path of the oncoming creature. The sharp, unexpected movement seemed to smash through the numbed stasis of the room. The Reaper screamed in harsh, discordant rage and, in that single instant, the silence flew apart into a chaos of frantic action and sound.

"Look out!" the Doctor's voice bellowed and then the jagged shards of broken glass were raining from the ceiling, plummeting downwards in a deadly hail.

Tejana fell to the soft carpet with a thud, unharmed but with all the breath knocked out of her. A heavy weight lay across her, pinning her to the floor. More screaming filled the air and a sticky warmth seemed to spread across her chest. With a sudden gasp of horror, she realised that the weight lying on top of her was the Master and she was covered with his blood.

"_Koschei!_"

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><p>The Master had watched the Reaper appear like magic in the air above them, but he had been unable to believe what he was seeing. A creature of myth, a dark fairytale sprung to life, right out of his earliest dreams.<p>

There had never been much room in his childhood for make-believe or fairytales. His stern, autocratic father had seen to that. Everything had been about duty and responsibility, about bringing honour to the House of Oakdown and upholding the family name. But then, when he went to the Academy, he had met Theta and his friend had introduced him to a whole new world of imagination. He could still remember the two of them huddling together under a blanket in their dormitory late at night, avidly reading by torchlight from the books he was forbidden to bring home, stories about fantastical creatures like the legendary Reapers, the ghostly Eidolon, the vicious, mischievous Toclafane.

And now, in a surreal twist of fate, here they were, he and the Doctor, centuries later and on a different world, staring up at a real Reaper, hovering above them with death in its eyes.

In a flash of realisation, he saw that the creature's unnatural gaze was not fixed on him, but on the woman in his arms, its devastating hunger and desire heavy and palpable in the still air.

The Doctor's voice echoed in his head. _Give Tejana back to me...she's the one causing the paradox._

He felt her small body relax against him. There was no fight in her at all as she gazed up at the approaching monster, acceptance of her fate in every line of her slender figure. So simple then...to save himself, all he had to do was to give Tejana to the Reapers and cancel the paradox. All he had to do was to throw her aside and stand back, allowing her to be consumed. Just one quick, easy action and this would all be over.

A split second before the Reaper struck, a split second for him to decide.

But his hands were still resting on the swell of her stomach. His child. His _son, _growing inside her.

And instead of hurling her aside, he found himself lifting her into his arms and swinging her out of harm's way, stumbling back behind his desk with her cradled protectively against him.

Somewhere behind him, he heard Dexter scream horribly, the sound trailing away into a choked gurgle. The Doctor gave a warning shout and the next thing he felt was a hot stab of excruciating pain as something struck his back hard.

Then he was falling forward into the darkness.

* * *

><p><em>I'm too late! <em>the Doctor thought in shock, watching the Reaper swoop down towards his daughter. _I can't save her!  
><em>

But almost before he could complete the thought, he saw the Master gather Tejana into his arms and drag her aside. The Reaper shrieked, a hair-raising, high-pitched howl of frustration, its beady scarlet gaze fastening instead on the unfortunate Miss Dexter, who still stood in its path, frozen with terror. Its clawed talons extended, reaching for her. In a blur of movement, it ripped out her throat while she still screamed, her eyes bulging in overwhelming fear. Then there was a blinding flash of light and Dexter was gone, vanishing into thin air.

At exactly the same instant, a tremor seemed to ripple through the field of hanging glass shards above them, like a breeze brushing across a corn field.

"Look out!" the Doctor roared, grabbing both Rory and Amy by the scruff of their necks and pulling them backwards towards the safety of the doorway. There was an ominous swishing, tinkling sound, and the glass began to hurtle to the floor, slicing into the carpet like a multitude of long, sharp swords.

A terrified cry from Tejana rang across the room. "_Koschei!_"

Whirling back towards the sound of her voice, the Doctor saw the Master sprawled across the floor behind his desk, with Tejana's tiny form almost hidden beneath him. For a moment, he couldn't understand why the Master was suddenly wearing a red shirt. But then, with a twinge of horror, he realised that one of the dagger-like shards of glass was embedded deeply in the other man's back. Blood was pumping freely from the dreadful wound, staining his white shirt a vibrant scarlet.

Having finished off Dexter, the Reaper rose into the air again like a great hawk. The paradox was still in place, its job was still not done. Lazily, it circled the fallen Time Lord and the woman he protected, preparing to strike again.

And, all at once, the Doctor realised the creature was not alone. Other dark shadows swooped and glided across the broken skylight, as more of the creatures landed on the roof, homing in at last on the persistent temporal disturbance calling to them from below.

_So many of them_, he thought in stunned despair. _And there's not one damn thing I can do._


	11. Chapter 11

_**Author's Note: Thank you very much to the following people for reviewing the last chapter – Catelly, Aietradaea, Theta'sWorstNightmare, SawManiac211, MayFairy, MountainLord-92, Lexy Summers, Imorgen, Dryu, Bernice-Summerfield and xNinjaxBunnyx.**_

_**Only one more to go after this, I think. I wrote this chapter listening to "The Reluctant Warrior", by Immediate Music from their Trailerhead album. Very angsty.**_

_**Hope everyone enjoys...  
><strong>_

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><p><strong>CHAPTER ELEVEN<strong>

The Reaper dipped lower, its gnarled talons reaching for the Master's prone and defenceless body.

With no real idea of what he was going to do, the Doctor surged forward with a wordless shout, the coloured glass crunching into powder beneath his boots as he ran. But before he could reach the Master, Tejana managed to struggle free from beneath the other Time Lord and jump to her feet, throwing herself between him and the descending creature.

"NO!" she screamed up at it, her hands held out in horror before her, as though in supplication, dripping red with the Master's blood. Her face was suddenly fully alert and agonisingly aware of what was going on. "Don't you TOUCH him! I'm the one you want. Don't you understand? _I _did this! It's my fault, _all my fault_!"

At that moment, the air was filled with a familiar wheezing, groaning sound, loud enough to be almost deafening. With a harsh cry, the Reaper spiralled upwards again, away from Tejana, sensing danger and circling around to face it. The Doctor stopped in mid-stride and whirled around in disbelief, just in time to see the familiar blue outline of his TARDIS materialising in the middle of the room.

_No, it is not your fault, child, _came a calm, clear voice, rippling melodically through the psychic link. _The fault is mine. And I will make it right._

With that, the double doors of the time machine slowly swung open, to reveal a flood of golden light. Shading his eyes against the blinding glare, the Doctor could faintly make out a shadow standing there in the doorway, the faintest impression of a figure, like a ghost, the silhouette of a woman in a elaborate Victorian party dress, her long, curly hair dressed high on her head and flowing down her back.

"Idris!" he breathed in amazement.

The Reaper threw back its head and shrieked in rage and fear at the newcomer, before plunging towards Tejana like a flaming sword of vengeance. But before it could touch her, Idris flung out her hand in a single, graceful gesture and pointed at the creature. A cascade of artron energy, sparkling like a storm of tiny, angry fireflies, streamed through the air from her fingers to envelop the Reaper in a refulgent halo of light.

_Back to the Time Vortex, creature of darkness, back where you belong, _she commanded. _In the name of the Imprimatur of Rassilon, I banish you from this world._

The Reaper screamed again and beat its wings vigorously, trying to rise towards the ceiling. But already the glittering sparkles of energy were eating away at its dark body, dissolving it like acid, shredding it like a nightmare, until bit by bit it vanished into thin air.

_You must hurry, my thief, _Idris warned, turning her ghostly head towards where the Doctor stood, frozen in stunned relief. Her psychic voice was much weaker now, as though her efforts to repel the Reaper had taken a tremendous toll on her. _I can hold back the others, but not for much longer. The paradox must be resolved._

Even as she spoke, her shadowy image seemed to ripple and fade, becoming more and more insubstantial, until it merged with the golden light and was no longer visible.

"Amy, Rory, into the TARDIS, _now_!" the Doctor yelled.

Recognising the note of command in his voice, the human couple hurried across to the time machine without even arguing once.

The Doctor turned back towards his daughter. She was kneeling on the ground in the midst of the sea of broken glass, the Master's head on her lap. She had pulled the blade-like shard of glass out of his back and had wadded up his shirt to put pressure on the pulsing wound, trying to stop the bleeding. His eyes were closed, his unconscious face as white as freshly-blown snow.

"Tejana..." the Doctor said.

"He's going to be OK," she interrupted, her words rushed and almost manic, as if she knew what he was going to say and didn't want to hear it. "He won't need to regenerate. See? The wound's closing...he's healing already. There's nothing to worry about. It's all going to be OK now."

"Tejana, listen to me!" the Doctor urged. "You have to come with me, now."

She shook her head, over and over again, as though she couldn't stop herself, her feverish gaze fixed on the Master's still face. "No. No, I'm not leaving him behind, not again. Never again."

Up above, beyond the protective golden haze still emanating from the doors of the time machine, the Doctor could sense the ominous winged shadows still swooping and swirling like hungry birds of prey, single-mindedly searching for a way to get through to them.

"The TARDIS can't hold back the Reapers for much longer," the Doctor said, crouching down beside her, his hand on her shoulder. "And as long as we're here, the wound in Time can't heal itself. We have to leave, right now!"

Her green eyes met his, her gaze wild and frantic. "Then he comes with us, in the TARDIS! She can sustain the paradox. We can make it work. My child will have his father. Everything will be the way it should be!"

The Doctor couldn't help flinching, the anguished pleading in her voice tearing at both his hearts. "We can't do that, Tejana, not without changing history!"

"But history would be better _without_ him in this time!" she said eagerly, desperate to convince him. "Just think...no Year That Never Was. All those people on _The Valiant_ whose lives were destroyed...if he comes with us now, none of that has to happen! We would be _helping_, not harming! You're the Doctor, you help people, that's what you do!"

"It doesn't work that way! You're a Time Lady - you know that!"

Anger exploded across her face. "_I don't care! _ Don't you get it, don't you see? If our positions were reversed, if it was me who had died, there would be nothing he wouldn't do to bring us back together, _nothing_! How can you expect me to do any less? Please, Doctor, I've never asked anything of you since I was eight years old, not once. I grew up without a father, I know better than anyone how terrible that can be. That was your choice back then. It's your choice again now. Don't condemn my child to that same misery. If you care for me at all, even the smallest bit, please, _please_, give me this!"

The Doctor stared helplessly at her, pain and guilt burning inside him. When she was eight years old and he had been running away from Gallifrey, she had begged him to take her with him and he had refused, a mistake he had bitterly regretted a thousand times over since then. And it was true – her stiff-necked pride had never allowed her to ask him for a single thing since that day, no matter how much he wished she would. _Until now_. And in this moment, there was nothing he wanted more than to be a father to his daughter, nothing he wanted more than to put her ahead of everything else and grant her request. But with a stab of sorrow, he knew that, yet again, she had asked him for something he just couldn't give.

"Tejana, I love you more than you'll ever know," he said gently. "But he isn't your Koschei. He looks like him and sounds like him, but it isn't him and he never will be, if you change history. The man you loved went through so much more, _became_ so much more than what he is now. Do you really want to take that away from him?"

She faltered, grief clouding her delicate features, her fingers softly stroking through the Master's hair, her eyes unseeing and filled with pain. "Oh gods, father, help me. I can't...I don't know what to do..."

Tears filled his eyes at the aching, child-like plea, so unlike the strong, capable Time Lady his daughter had always been. "Listen to me! No matter how bad things have got between us, you've always trusted me. You have to trust me now. Take my hand, Tejana, come with me, _please_!"

He held out his hand to her, willing her to take it with both of his hearts. She looked at it, a tiny frown on her face, as if she didn't understand what he was asking. There was a flash through the psychic link and, all at once, he shared her grief-stricken memories of another hand extended towards her.

_Come with me...I'll never hurt you, Ana..._

And with the memory, her eyes fell back to the Master's unheeding face in her lap. The confusion seemed to fall away from her gaze and a small sad smile teased the corners of her mouth. "He's right," she whispered, tracing the Master's features lovingly with her fingertips. "Right now, hurting is all you know how to do. You're not my Koschei, not yet. But you will be. One day, _amin Mekhil_, you're going to set my Universe on fire. And I have to give you the chance to do that."

Leaning down, she kissed him tenderly on the forehead. As if in response to her caress, he stirred and groaned, his head tossing back and forth. Carefully, she lifted him from her lap and laid him on the ground. "Goodbye, love," she said brokenly. "I'll always be glad I had the chance to tell you about our son."

Turning back to the Doctor, she paused for a tiny moment, her gaze meeting his, empty and desolate. Then, before she could change her mind, she put her hand into his. His fingers closed tightly around hers and he drew her to her feet, slipping a comforting arm around her waist. Holding her close to him, he led her towards the double doors of the TARDIS, leaving the Master behind. The golden light retracted with them, shimmering all around them like a heavenly aura, ebbing back into the time machine as they went, leaving the room in darkness.

The Doctor took one last glance over his shoulder, looking sadly at the dim figure of his old enemy, stretched out on the floor. Then there came the grinding noise of the time rotor beginning to oscillate and he could feel a cold wind on his face as the paradox unwound itself and Time started to reverse, the hours and minutes and seconds rushing by him in a virulent swirl of temporal energy.

Reaching out, the Doctor closed the TARDIS doors.

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><p><em><strong>Author's Note: OK, before anyone sends me any testy PM's, the canon basis for this chapter is that in the episode "Father's Day", the Doctor says "...once I've got my ship back, I can mend everything..." He also says that, once upon a time, the Time Lords could have controlled the actions of the Reapers. So, I took it from this that the TARDIS would have the power to repel the Reapers and close the wound in Time, once the paradox was removed. Also, I just love Idris, and wanted to have her save everyone in this, so there. <strong>_


	12. Chapter 12

_**Author's Note: **_

_**Hello! Thank you to everyone who reviewed since I posted the previous chapter – Aietradaea, Theta'sWorstNightmare, Lexy Summers, EDZEL2 (x 7), xNinjaxBunnyx, MountainLord-92, mericat, Imorgen, MayFairy, SawManiac211 and Catelly.**_

_**So here it is, last chapter – hooray, I finished something! **Goes off to celebrate** **_

_**This was written listening to Avril Lavigne's song, "Slipped Away", which I thought was very appropriate. Hope everybody enjoys!**_

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><p><strong>CHAPTER TWELVE<strong>

The beautiful, other-worldly golden glow had faded from inside the TARDIS now, leaving behind a dull red light that was difficult to see by. The time-rotor sounded wrong too, sawing back and forth with a distressed wheezing sound, as though it was struggling to keep going at all.

"Hang in there, Sexy," the Doctor said, patting the console reassuringly. "We'll get you to the Rift for a recharge. You'll be back in tip-top condition in no time!"

"Doctor, what happened?" Amy demanded. "Why does the TARDIS sound so sick?"

The Doctor looked at her gravely. "Once, before the Time War, in a situation like this, my people would have been powerful enough to repel the Reapers and repair the wound in Time without even batting an eyelid. Now that they're gone, it's not nearly that easy any more. Fortunately for us, thanks to the Imprimatur of Rassilon – and don't ask me about the Imprimatur of Rassilon, it's too hard to explain – a remnant of that power still remains within the TARDIS. She sensed the disturbance in the space/time continuum caused by a multitude of Reapers converging on one single location in London. That meant she was able to materialise at those coordinates and use her power to mend the damage that had been caused. But it's taken nearly everything she has...a few minutes more and it would have been too late."

"So what do we do now?" Rory inquired, staring worriedly at the sluggish time-rotor.

"We'll head for the Cardiff space/time Rift. It bleeds temporal energy. All I need to do is open up the engines and soak up the energy for the TARDIS to use as fuel. Then she'll be as good as gold!" the Doctor replied, flicking some switches on the navigational terminal. "And after that..." He paused, his youthful face settling into grim, determined lines. "After that, I'm going to put a Time Lock on the Earth Year 2008. Time has already been re-written far too often at that point in history. It's stretched the fabric of the space/time continuum almost to breaking point. No-one can ever be allowed to change things there again, it would be catastrophic."

Amy raised her head and looked down the stairs towards the entrance to the TARDIS. The double doors were wide open again, giving a spectacular view of the Earth as they orbited around her, glowing in the darkness of space like a green and blue jewel. A small, copper-haired figure was seated in the doorway, her shoulders hunched in misery as she stared unseeingly down at the planet below.

"And the Master?" Amy asked the Doctor softly.

He didn't look up, busily tinkering with some more of the TARDIS controls before he answered. "Dead," he said at last in a wooden voice. "Still dead. As least as far as her time-line is concerned. Nothing changed, history carried on just as before."

"You have to talk to her, Doctor," Amy told him. "Properly, I mean. She needs you. She needs her father."

The Doctor didn't reply, still keeping his eyes steadily averted, refusing to allow Amy to see what was in them. But he gave a brief, tight nod of assent.

"We'll give you some space," Amy said. "Come on, Rory, let's go and put the kettle on."

With that, the two of them tactfully retreated, leaving the Doctor standing alone at the console. He fiddled unnecessarily with the controls a bit more, putting off the inevitable. But then, with a deep sigh, he took his courage in his hands and quietly descended the stairs to sit next to his daughter.

He could feel the anguish emanating from her, so great that it was almost tangible, as though something essential was broken inside her. He ached to put his arm around her, wanting to comfort her, but he wasn't sure how she would react. So he just sat close to her, shoulder to shoulder, not saying anything.

A savage pang of regret pierced his hearts. When she was younger, when she had first run away from Gallifrey to join him in the TARDIS, they had often sat like this, after their human companions had gone to bed, in perfect, silent companionship, their feet dangling out into space, looking out over the Universe together. Tejana had always been so eager, so fascinated by everything, so delighted to have escaped her stifling life on their home planet. But he couldn't remember the last time they had done it. Centuries ago, before the Time War, he supposed. Before everything changed. He found himself swallowing hard against a sudden lump in his throat. Where did the time go? How in all the Universe had they come to this?

Tejana turned her head slowly to look at him, her green eyes dark with pain. "I'm sorry," she said stiffly. "I was wrong. So wrong. If the TARDIS hadn't sent that Reaper back into the Vortex..."

"It's OK," he cut in, hating the hard, defeated, empty look on her face. He'd never seen her look like that before, not even when he found her again after the Time War. He was the Doctor, the man that was supposed to make people better. It killed him inside that, of all people, he wasn't able to heal his own daughter when she needed him most. "You're grieving. Grief makes people do strange things. I understand that."

"Do you?" she asked, a faint thread of scepticism running through her voice, as though she doubted it very much.

The question was meant to hurt him and it did, particularly given the edge of bitterness behind it. But it was a chink in her armour of grief, an opening, the first one she had allowed him since her return to the TARDIS. And, in view of the vehemence of his opposition in the past to her relationship with the Master, he supposed he couldn't blame her for doubting his sincerity now.

He chose his next words very carefully, not wanting to shatter the fragile emotional bridge that was suddenly between them. "I once burned up an entire sun, just to say goodbye to Rose. That was wrong too, interfering in the structure and balance of the Universe for my own purposes. But I didn't care, just as long as I got to see her just once more."

The green eyes scanned his face. "Did it help?"

There was a deep pause and then he replied sadly, "No."

She nodded, shifting her gaze away from him, staring blankly out to the stars once more. An inexplicable sense of failure suddenly weighed him down, knowing that his words had been inadequate and meant nothing to her.

Her voice rang in his head, a memory of what she had said to him back in Harold Saxon's office: "_If our positions were reversed, if it was me who had died, there would be nothing he wouldn't do to bring us back together, NOTHING!"_

Her words sat in his stomach like a stone. As much as he had hated Tejana being with the Master, he knew what she had said was absolutely true. If Tejana had been the one to fall into another dimension instead of Rose, the Master would never have burned up a sun just to say goodbye. He would have searched, ruthlessly and unceasingly, until he found a way to rip open the Universe to get his woman back. And Tejana would have stood on the sand of Bad Wolf Bay and waited patiently, knowing with complete certainty that the man she loved would come for her. _How long had Rose waited?_ How long had she stood there before it had finally dawned on her that the man _she_ loved was never coming? The Doctor felt sick inside. He'd never really allowed himself to think about it before. But all at once he saw himself clearly through his daughter's eyes, through the eyes of all the companions he had ever had, and the image wasn't pleasant – not the man who made people better, but the man who left them behind.

Beside him, a terrible shiver seemed to run through Tejana, wracking her slender body from head to toe. "I..._miss._..him," she choked out. "So much. It's...crushing me. And I...feel like...I can't breathe...without him."

Then she brought her hands up to her face and, for the first time since losing the Master, she began to cry; deep, awful, shuddering sobs, that seemed to be ripped from her soul, tearing through her entire body. The Doctor reached out and put his hand on her shoulder. She flinched away, as if his touch burnt her. But he had allowed her to push him away too many times before and this time he would not be deterred. He tried again and at last she allowed him to draw her to him. She buried her face in his lap like a little child and wept silently while he held her close and made the small, meaningless noises you make when you know the pain is so vast that nothing you can ever do will fix it.

_Everything has its time and everything dies..._

His own eyes misted over and, instead of the blue and green panorama of the Earth below, he saw again the glorious orange skies of Gallifrey, stretching above him, so long ago; felt the summer heat from the twin suns beating lazily against his skin; his legs pleasantly aching from running fast, so very fast, through the long, red grass on the slopes of Mount Perdition.

"_Best friends, Koschei?"_

"_Best friends forever, Theta!"_

Through Tejana's storm of grief, he could feel the tiny, pulsating glow within the psychic link, the new Time Lord consciousness beginning to unfurl inside his daughter, growing day by day, preparing to take its rightful place within the Universe.

The Master's son. The Doctor's grandson. After centuries of fighting across the constellations, the tiny life that would now always link them together, even after death.

And, unbidden, the hot, painful tears came, streaking down his cheeks.

"I know, Tejana," he whispered, gently stroking her long, copper-coloured hair. "Believe me, I know."

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><p>Back in 2008, Harold Saxon pushed his dessert bowl away from him and sat back in his chair, gazing contemptuously out over the crowd of humans seated in the ballroom of the Claridges Hotel.<p>

_The last time, _he gloated to himself. _The very last time I have to speak to this toad-eating rabble before I become their Lord and Master._

Oh, the blissful relief of it. The game had been fun at first, but now he was bored and couldn't wait for it to be over.

Suddenly, he caught his breath, a weird, unsettling feeling seeping coldly through his brain. A small shadow caught his eye at the back of the room, moving just beyond his vision, impossible to clearly make out. At the sight, time seemed to hitch and spin, a crazy, mixed-up surge of sensations assailing him, as if a whole day had passed in a whirling rush, compressed into a few, fleeting seconds – he felt triumph; an incredible, blazing lust; overwhelming shock; intense fear and then an excruciating pain stabbing through his back that took his breath away; then soft, slender fingers gently caressing his face...

"Harry?" he heard Lucy say anxiously, her voice distant and far away. "Harry! Are you all right?"

His hands were clenched tightly before him. Trembling, he forced them open and there, sitting on his palm, was a tiny gentian blue flower with a golden centre. It was a myosotis flower. _A forget-me-not_. He stared at it uncomprehendingly, an icy shiver racking him from head to toe.

_Was this what the humans mean when they say a goose just walked over their grave? _he thought wildly, closing his eyes dizzily. Something had just happened to Time, some sort of glitch. As a Time Lord, there was no mistaking it. But what? And why? Could it have anything to do with the Doctor? Had he escaped from Malcaissaro after all?

"Harry!" he heard Lucy say again, this time more urgently, interrupting the frantic questions that were besieging his mind.

He opened his eyes again. His hands were empty. The myosotis flower had gone, as if it had never really been there at all. Like a ghost.

In the background, the fat man with the large, black moustache was introducing him. "And now, ladies and gentlemen, without any further ado, I give you our guest of honour...Harold Saxon."

The room erupted in a storm of expectant applause. With an effort, he pulled himself together. Whatever it had been, everything seemed back to normal now. And Harold Saxon still had a job to do.

"I'm fine," he hissed at Lucy in a savage undertone, before rising to his feet. "Just fine!"

But as he took his place behind the lectern and began to speak, he found his thoughts inexplicably wandering back to his childhood on Gallifrey and the time he had spent at the Academy with the Doctor - all the things they had done together, all the stories they had read, all the hopes and dreams and imaginings they had shared so long ago.

And suddenly, it came to him, in a blinding revelation. At last he knew what he would call the deadly silver spheres he had found at the end of the Universe.

_The Toclafane._

It was so fitting, so perfect. And when the Doctor arrived, as he surely would, he would get it, wouldn't he? The bitter irony of it?

Because, in the end, when you came down to it, that's all life was, wasn't it?

_Nothing but a twisted fairytale._

_**- THE END -**  
><em>

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><p>"SLIPPED AWAY"<p>

"I miss you, miss you so bad.  
>I don't forget you, oh it's so sad.<br>I hope you can hear me,  
>I remember it clearly...<p>

The day you slipped away,  
>Was the day I found it won't be the same.<p>

I didn't get around to kiss you,  
>Goodbye on the hand.<br>I wish that I could see you again,  
>I know that I can't.<p>

Oh, I hope you can hear me,

Cause I remember it clearly.

The day you slipped away,  
>Was the day I found it won't be the same.<p>

I had my wake up,  
>Won't you wake up?<br>I keep asking why?  
>And I can't take it,<br>It wasn't fake,  
>It happened, you passed by.<p>

Now you're gone, now you're gone,  
>There you go, there you go,<br>Somewhere I can't bring you back!  
>Now you're gone, now you're gone,<br>There you go, there you go,  
>Somewhere you're not coming back!<p>

The day you slipped away  
>Was the day I found it won't be the same, no...<br>The day you slipped away  
>Was the day that I found it won't be the same, oh...<p>

I miss you."

- Avril Lavigne.

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><p><em><strong>Another Author's Note: So there it is, all done and dusted. This will be my last update for quite a few weeks. So, to all my lovely reviewers, I would just like to bid you a fond adieu and to say thankyou, you were magnificent. See you on the other side!<strong>_


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